I walk in a room and for the most part one of the first things I will notice is a left handed person. When I do, I feel a sense of euphoria…I can almost picture myself giving a stamp of approval, thrilled that I spotted another member of our tribe.
Yes, you have guessed it, I am left handed and I married a left handed genius, naturally.
Some famous people that belong to this tribe: Fidel Castro, Alexander the Great, Michelangelo, Jimi Hendrix, Barack Obama, Angelina Jolie, to mention but a few. I think it is safe to say that left-handers are a special breed of extraordinary people. No, I don’t discriminate against nor do I look down onto right handers…I merely have to acknowledge/admit that we are different.
I reckon being the only left handed person in my household whilst growing up must have caused many a headache for my parents. There were times I had no choice, but to learn how to do things ‘their’ way, purely because it was difficult for them to teach me to do things left handed. Although I have turned out to be a bit of a half breed, I think my parents did a pretty sterling job.
My Blessing; My Curse
Being a lefty in a right-handed world is not always easy and to be honest it does cause some frustrations. I for one experience brain freeze when I have something in both my hands. Someday soon I will do some research on this. If you want me to open a door when I have something in both my hands, I do not know what to do, how to open the door, which hand do I ‘free’ to open the door? It is a serious challenge; I will inevitably then try and open the door with my elbow or my knee or even my foot. Sounds bizarre I know…
I walk into a bank and the complimentary pen on the string will always be on the right, this forces me to take the pen with my right hand, pass it to my left hand….and low and behold the string of the pen is too short to allow me to sign on the dotted line with my left hand …this again forces me to move my entire body to the right or completely misalign my upper body by stretching to the right to be able to sign where I need to. Frustration!! Also by now I have lost interest in making an effort to make a perfect signature so it looks like crap. The lady behind the counter then looks at my signature and compares it to the perfect one on her screen and of course it looks totally different. I now need to explain that it is really me and why there is such a huge difference in the signatures.
I walk into the grocery store, collect everything I need, make my way to the counter make the payment by debit card, the cashier then wants me to sign her slip and puts it in on the till slip signing pad, as you can see below, space is so limited that I have to bash my left hand to the computer screen to get this job done.
When you are right-handed you have the privilege of being able to have a hand rest when writing, chances are that you will never have to worry about ink smudging. Being left handed though you never have a comfortable writing pad, it is either off the pad or resting on the left hand side of the double paged book trying very hard to write on the inside cover whilst your right hand has to push the left pages down. Writing from left to right with the pen that is loaded with ink … It will smudge… It always does… It is a mess…. It is a frustration. Don’t even talk about arch lever files with their huge steel barriers… It really is super difficult to write on the front pages… The back of the page is really easy (maybe we should all follow the Chinese)… But not the front…..!!
Then there is my infamous struggle with the telephone. Since I can remember my office phone has always been positioned to my right. Why? Well because I write with my left hand so basically my right hand is ‘free’ to answer the phone. As much as I would like to believe that I can multitask this is in fact a myth. I will stop whatever I was busy doing, pick up the phone with my right hand, in order for me to have a pen and paper ready should I need to make notes. This is the bit where it gets tricky. I will always change the phone from my right ear to my left (must be because I hear better with my left ear too)..but this makes it difficult to write with my left hand and simultaneously balance the phone with me left shoulder. This position is really uncomfortable and alas I will move the phone back to my right ear. A couple of hundred phone calls like this and my telephone cord looks like this……………..Tangled, knotted and twisted beyond believe. I truly believe I have a gift, my boss must have spotted this co-ordination disaster and decided to reward me with a cordless phone….! This has changed my life!!
Life as a lefty is interesting. Some believe we are geniuses, others think we are mad hatters, I believe lefties are specially selected, you are born to be different and in many cases indifferent, we challenge the status quo, we don’t conform, we are divergent.
Although in the minority, the left are a culture on our own, trying to change the world one small achievement at a time.
I am left handed… What’s your super power?
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Yes, you have guessed it, I am left handed and I married a left handed genius, naturally.
Some famous people that belong to this tribe: Fidel Castro, Alexander the Great, Michelangelo, Jimi Hendrix, Barack Obama, Angelina Jolie, to mention but a few. I think it is safe to say that left-handers are a special breed of extraordinary people. No, I don’t discriminate against nor do I look down onto right handers…I merely have to acknowledge/admit that we are different.
I reckon being the only left handed person in my household whilst growing up must have caused many a headache for my parents. There were times I had no choice, but to learn how to do things ‘their’ way, purely because it was difficult for them to teach me to do things left handed. Although I have turned out to be a bit of a half breed, I think my parents did a pretty sterling job.
My Blessing; My Curse
Being a lefty in a right-handed world is not always easy and to be honest it does cause some frustrations. I for one experience brain freeze when I have something in both my hands. Someday soon I will do some research on this. If you want me to open a door when I have something in both my hands, I do not know what to do, how to open the door, which hand do I ‘free’ to open the door? It is a serious challenge; I will inevitably then try and open the door with my elbow or my knee or even my foot. Sounds bizarre I know…
I walk into a bank and the complimentary pen on the string will always be on the right, this forces me to take the pen with my right hand, pass it to my left hand….and low and behold the string of the pen is too short to allow me to sign on the dotted line with my left hand …this again forces me to move my entire body to the right or completely misalign my upper body by stretching to the right to be able to sign where I need to. Frustration!! Also by now I have lost interest in making an effort to make a perfect signature so it looks like crap. The lady behind the counter then looks at my signature and compares it to the perfect one on her screen and of course it looks totally different. I now need to explain that it is really me and why there is such a huge difference in the signatures.
I walk into the grocery store, collect everything I need, make my way to the counter make the payment by debit card, the cashier then wants me to sign her slip and puts it in on the till slip signing pad, as you can see below, space is so limited that I have to bash my left hand to the computer screen to get this job done.
When you are right-handed you have the privilege of being able to have a hand rest when writing, chances are that you will never have to worry about ink smudging. Being left handed though you never have a comfortable writing pad, it is either off the pad or resting on the left hand side of the double paged book trying very hard to write on the inside cover whilst your right hand has to push the left pages down. Writing from left to right with the pen that is loaded with ink … It will smudge… It always does… It is a mess…. It is a frustration. Don’t even talk about arch lever files with their huge steel barriers… It really is super difficult to write on the front pages… The back of the page is really easy (maybe we should all follow the Chinese)… But not the front…..!!
Then there is my infamous struggle with the telephone. Since I can remember my office phone has always been positioned to my right. Why? Well because I write with my left hand so basically my right hand is ‘free’ to answer the phone. As much as I would like to believe that I can multitask this is in fact a myth. I will stop whatever I was busy doing, pick up the phone with my right hand, in order for me to have a pen and paper ready should I need to make notes. This is the bit where it gets tricky. I will always change the phone from my right ear to my left (must be because I hear better with my left ear too)..but this makes it difficult to write with my left hand and simultaneously balance the phone with me left shoulder. This position is really uncomfortable and alas I will move the phone back to my right ear. A couple of hundred phone calls like this and my telephone cord looks like this……………..Tangled, knotted and twisted beyond believe. I truly believe I have a gift, my boss must have spotted this co-ordination disaster and decided to reward me with a cordless phone….! This has changed my life!!
Life as a lefty is interesting. Some believe we are geniuses, others think we are mad hatters, I believe lefties are specially selected, you are born to be different and in many cases indifferent, we challenge the status quo, we don’t conform, we are divergent.
Although in the minority, the left are a culture on our own, trying to change the world one small achievement at a time.
I am left handed… What’s your super power?
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