Cover Photo: This illustration is of a person doing the yoga pose "child's pose in prayer."
Illustration by Tavishi Sahu

My Writing History Is Best Told Through Handwriting

Aditi Malhotra tells us about how handwriting has been a through line in her friendships, shows how handwriting can be incorporated into a generative practice, and offers some tried-and-tested stress-relief postures for happy handwriters.

Hopefully, I’ll crawl back into a space of sacred semblance

This photograph shows a page of the author's notebook, with some quotes written down, some notes taken, and a drawing of a bird and a beetle

write-repeat-write-repeat

This photograph shows a couple of pages of the author's notebook, including a drawing of someone's torso

This photograph shows a page from the author's notebook, including some scribbles that almost look like a written language but are labeled as "feeling," "pain," and "breathe"
Photograph courtesy of Aditi Malhotra

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Table pose and cat/cow

This illustration shows a visual representation of the yoga pose described above

Table post and cat/cow with inverted wrist stretch

This illustration shows a visual representation of the yoga pose described above

Table pose and cat/cow with fists

This illustration shows a visual representation of the yoga pose described above

Child’s pose with hand in prayer

This illustration shows a visual representation of the yoga pose described above
Illustration by Tavishi Sahu

Writing Down the Bones.

Don’t handwrite alone! If you write by hand, tell us what draws you to the practice? Do you follow any techniques to keep your hands fit, your writing fine? Where do you draw the line?

Aditi Malhotra is a writer, freelance journalist, and educator in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is a professional juggler of many editorial hats. Currently, she’s writing a book on epilepsy from a public health perspective at Hesperian Health Guides. Her news writing and narrative nonfiction has appeared in Huffington Post, PBS Newshour, theAtlantic.com, Hechinger Report and Wall Street Journal, among others. She also writes poetry, fictional prose, and performs spoken word. Her work spans intersections of gender and migration, mental health and education, food and identity, and books!