I have also struggled with cursive all of my longish life. I can do it, and it’s legible, but it is pretty ugly. Yet I am a woman with a bit of artistic talent. So I am thinking your assessment does not hold.
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If you’re writing in block print in a hurry, you begin to drag the pen or pencil slightly, connecting letters. You also start picking up loops to form the upstrokes and downstrokes for the same reason. It begins to take on the character of cursive, an ugly form of it, but it’s there.
Cursive is a more efficient, less laborious way of writing longhand, that’s all it is. That it lends itself to stylistic flourishes and individuality is secondary. You don’t have to lift the pen or pencil from paper nearly as much, it flows and is a faster way of writing for those who are proficient.
The advent of computer keyboards in widespread use has rendered handwriting of all forms secondary, and so it’s suffered. I don’t do so well writing out a long paragraph myself anymore, my hand feels cramped after a while. That wasn’t the case when handwritten was the norm and typewritten was specialized.