#lefthandedproblems

Not so much to about 90% of the population, though. In fact, most right-handed folk don’t often have to think about handedness. I almost never hear right-handed people use terms like ‘righty’ or ‘lefty’ – unless they are close to a left-handed person or they are talking about a left-handed person. Us lefties talk about it all the time; our world is framed in terms of left and right because most of the world is built wrong – for us, anyway.

August 13. It’s fun when it falls on a Friday, because on that ill-fated day of improbability, lefties might just gain our maximum evil? I prefer it when August 13 falls on a Tuesday; I am told that Tuesday is ‘lefty’s luck day.’ (Whatever that means.)

My ramblings here will be largely apocryphal and anecdotal and not really sourced, but I bet a quick google search will turn up an article or ten confirming most of what I’m writing about. (Google will not likely confirm my opinions, as much as I wish my opinions were important enough for google searches to confirm them.)

But I’ve been left handed my entire life and thus been interested in information about being left handed my entire life. In fact, being left-handed was one of the first concepts I consciously integrated into my personal identity. And the first thing I was consciously aware made me different (statistically speaking). Not the last, for sure. (The percentage of men with fibromyalgia is probably higher than we think it is, because reasons I’ll rant about in other posts, but it’s still a small percentage.)

One upon a time, left-handed was associated with bad habits, rebellious attitudes, criminality, considered an indication of madness (hearing voices, being demonically possessed, neurotic), and was generally perceived as a mark of being touched by the devil. (Satan, of course, was often depicted as being left-handed.) We were also considered to be creative and predisposed to music. I can’t prove it, but I bet there’s some correlation between lefties being considered insane, depraved, perverse, and infernally-associated artists might have something to do with the cultural perception of artists in general.

Of course, knowing these factoids about left handers causes a few brief seconds of self-reflection (every single time I read them). While I’m sure my dear, departed mother would enthusiastically agree with ‘rebellious attitudes.’ but would  derisively dismiss the ‘musical aptitude’ myth. I have all the musical talent of a tone-deaf three year old pounding sticky fingers on a cheap plastic piano – which is to say, none. (I don’t sing. It’s one of the few public services I offer.)

I proudly claim creativity, though, and I’ll admit to (more than) a few neuroses. My mother was the crazy one in our family – though, I’m sure she’d blame it on me (and maybe my brothers) instead of genetics. (We have receipts from my great-grandfather’s electroshock therapy. Interestingly enough, he was also a writer. I have no idea if he was left-handed.)

Apparently, the creativity thing is statistically relevant, because I’ve seen surveys that list 40% of people in ‘creative’ careers are left-handed. Now, I’m not entirely sure what that statistic measures – what careers were surveyed, or even what the statistic means by ‘creative career,’ but it’s worth noting that someone, somewhere, figured out lefties are pretty likely to want to do something creative with their lives and tried to measure it.

Someone also apparently surveyed and enumerated a statistic that lefties are 39% more likely to be homosexual, but as compared to what? Heterosexual, bisexual, asexual? (Of course, asexuals are supposedly 25 times more likely to be lefties.) I’m fairly certain that statistic isn’t accurate, and nor was it gathered out of benign curiosity, given the rampant prejudice towards anything not cisgendered and heterosexually oriented and the erasure of identities other than extreme ends of the sexuality and romantic spectrums. In fact, I’m sure if I cared enough about that statistic to dig into it, I would find it was an extension of the idea that lefties are somehow intrinsically born wrong and are inherently perverse. (Of course, any civilized, intelligent person can tell you that sexual orientation and gender identity have nothing to do with perversion and science has said the lefties are in their right minds, so…)

‘Left’ comes from an anglo saxon word ‘lyft’ – meaning ‘weak’ or ‘broken.’ And given that, biologically speaking, we are more prone to migraines, allergies, insomnia, alcoholism, autoimmune disease, asthma, dyslexia, and are more likely to have (other) language difficulties, I can almost see why. We also recover from strokes faster, but I’m sure ancient people saw that as a sign of infernal assistance. (Some psychiatrist somewhere also once said we process emotion differently and get angry faster. I haven’t ever found the details of this, but it does make me wonder about some (much) of my social issues.)

Also: ouch. I have migraines, allergies, autoimmune diseases – yes, more than one – dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, and have severe insomnia. Also, I needed speech therapy. Add in creativity, and I’m almost a poster-child for lefty issues. I’m straight, not an alcoholic, and, as far as I know, not demonically possessed or related to the devil. Even if some of my students might (do) disagree with the part about me not being related to or in communion with infernal forces. I do, after all, teach things like ‘deodorant is not optional’ and ‘clean up after yourself.’

(We are also typically less able to roll our tongues, but that hasn’t ever been one of my issues. But it might be related to some of the speech difficulties, depending on the language being learned.)

Did you know that ‘left handed compliment’ is a phrase meaning ‘politely insulted’ or that ‘left handed marriage’ is a way of saying ‘extramarital affair?’ I did. These phrases were explained to me in kindergarten by a classmate’s mother. She wanted to make sure I knew all the reasons I was probably destined to be a bad person unless I gave up my left-handed ways and embraced the righteousness of writing with the right hand. (Just think of all the meanings of the world ‘right.’)

My second grade teacher was also quite convinced my conversion was necessary. She used to slap my hands with a ruler for every word I wrote left-handed or transposed. (Left handed dyslexia was painful.) And if I wrote with my left hand, or argued about the necessity of slapping me with a thin piece of metal? I got to stay in at recess and practice writing right.

I missed a lot of recess in second grade. Most of it, actually. I refused to do as she asked, and she refused to accept that being left-handed didn’t make be inherently flawed. Or bad. (This was in the 1980s. Well after the golden age of medical practices like phrenology and exorcism.) I sometimes wonder if more people will end up left-handed as being left-handed becomes more accepted and fewer of us are forced to be right-handed.

Lefties do, supposedly, have some advantages. The whole ‘recover from strokes faster’ thing, for one. Creativity for another. No lie; I’m fond of that association. We’re also supposed to be better at 3D perception. (Wish I’d gotten than perk. I really do.) We’re supposed to be more musically aware. (That one missed me, too.) And artistically aware. (Jury’s out on that one for me.) Lefties are also associated with insight and intuition, imagination, and being more like to end up on the extreme ends of the intelligence spectrum. All those things that come from being right-brain dominant. Not sure if the science behind that still holds up, to be honest, but it’s a comforting though.

We are supposed to be better at multitasking, too But if you know me, you know that I know that multitasking is just rapid task switching, and often reduces effectiveness at what you are doing. I suppose lefties might be better at remaining effective while task switching, but I am still a believer in single tasking.

We are also considered clumsy, but that one can be solidly blamed on everyone else. Because the world (at least, the western world) is designed and built around right-handed thinking and kinesthetics. Scissors, power tools, computer, mice, coffee mugs, and did I mention power tools? I can’t really say the world is out to get me, but I can say that the world is designed in such a way that I need to be more careful than 90% (or so) of people. That statistic? I can pretty much say is accurate.

When I was in school, there were no left handed school desks – at least, in terms of the half-desks that some official somewhere thinks is enough room to work on. (True story: they aren’t.) You want to talk about contortion? That was a LOT of contortion. Painful. Probably (definitely) contributed to some of the physical issues I have now.

Which, you know, sucks. That because there are so few resources for left handed students that I caused myself permanent damage during my growth years.

There is the statistic that left handed people are more likely to loathe spiral notebooks – because to use them correctly, they dig into our arms. The more we had to use them, the worse it got. I had to get wound care treatment during my freshman year of high school because I got bits of the metal embedded in my arm, because I was not allowed to use loose leaf paper to take notes or do assignments. I had to use a spiral notebook.

I had to get a doctor’s note that I could not use one until I healed. It took until the middle fo the summer to completely heal.

My teachers? Not sympathetic. They said to me something they didn’t say to right handed students. “You know, it’s probably for the best that you learn to write with your other hand.”

My response of: ‘fuck you’ got me in trouble. But it was heartfelt and honest – and fair. Because instead of allowing me to use a different tool, I was supposed to either cause myself permanent injury or suddenly, rapidly, and in a real hurry develop the ability to write with the hand my brain was not wired to use.

Left-handed spiral notebooks exist, but they confuse teachers. Left handed coffee mugs exist. Left handed scissors. Other left handed products exist, but they are rare and far more expensive than right-handed ones. The left handed notebooks, for example, cost more, and are often only one subject. Normally, you need nice big ones for school. They are often decent quality though, despite being hard to find. Some of that is the lower demand means smaller manufacturing runs. So forth and so on.

No matter what I think of the way people have responded to left-handedness – and many of them are, at the least, frustrating (eating a small table? Best get the right corner seat, or the person next to you will dislike you, or you will have trouble eating. Small movements, and paying attention to everywhere your arm or hand or elbow goes.)

The truth of it is this: despite many theories, no one really knows what causes left handedness. There are some new theories about evolution of communities that explain why more people are right-handed, but as to what causes left-handedness? Some of the prevailing theories are oh-so-comforting: brain damage at birth or in utero, stressful/dramatic births, developmental issues with the fetus, and even brain defects. (Thanks, medical science. Still feeling the love.)

But today, a day few people know exists, is supposed to celebrate left-handedness. I wish Amazon had a sale on left-handed items, but I’ll have to find left-handed shops for that. I might only pay a little over the price of a right-handed item.

All frustration aside – I really want to ask everyone who reads this blog one thing. (Wait? Do people read this blog?) To be kind and patient with us lefties. Be patient with our slow eating, our careful use of tools, our (apparent) clumsiness, our odd handwriting. Especially young kids and teenagers who haven’t learned how to adapt as well as us older folk.

And to utterly, completely and totally give up the idea that we should just ‘learn to write right.’ Literally reprogramming our basic kinesthetic function is a pretty heft task. When you think about all of the habits people want to develop or get rid of, and how hard it is to just start new routines, change diets, procrastinate less, exercise more because it’s good for us, think about how much harder it is to re-write the basic functions ingrained in the brain.