My Secret Code Has Been Hacked

Like a lot of parents, I have made use of "secret code" when I want to communicate something I don't want the kids to understand. We all do it. It starts by spelling certain words, then progresses to writing them down. Once the kids learned to read, my fall back secret code has been writing things in cursive. Wesley just started learning cursive this year, but he isn't able to read it very well yet. And Ryan? Well, Ryan is in first grade, so no issues there, right?

Wrong!

The boys got Easter cards in the mail today from their great Aunt Marilyn. She wrote a nice note to each of them in cursive. Just an aside, my aunt's handwriting is beautiful! Mine never looks that good. Anyhow, Wesley was having a bit of difficulty reading it, so Duane read it for him. Then Ryan picked up his own card and confidently read his similar, but not identical, message out loud.

When I said something about it to Duane, he said that Ryan had probably just memorized what Duane had said when reading Wesley's card. I decided to test Ryan by finding a number of cursive words on my iPad and seeing if he could read them. He read every one correctly. I'm torn between being surprised, impressed, and mildly annoyed that I have to come up with a new code. Perhaps it's time to learn Klingon or Dothraki.