Lefties of the World Unite!
Wednesday, August 13, 2008 at 5:00AM 
Are you a southpaw? I am. Today, August 13th, is Left-Handers’ Day, our day to celebrate our right to be left-handed.
If you’re like me, you’re happy to be left-handed. It’s just one distinction among many, but I’m glad it’s there.
Although, to be truthful, I go through life not thinking much about my left-handedness except when someone hands me a pin across a desk so I can sign something. Reaching out to grab hold with my left hand always makes for an awkward second or two. And then there’s the bank. My bank has little pen stands fastened on the right, which means I have to reach across and bring the pen over to the left, and then write with the pesky pen cord running across my paper. It’s little annoyances like this that remind me that being left-handed does occasionally make a bit of a difference.
From the Left-Handers’ Day page, here’s a list of things that left-handers can find difficult. I’m going to go through the list and comment on whether I have trouble with each item. If you’re left-handed, why don’t you do this, too? You can use the comments here or a post your own blog to tell us the leftie problems you’ve encountered.
Crossing other peoples paths/position on pavement. I don’t think I have more trouble with this than everyone else does, but I’m not sure that I’d know if I did.
Hugging. Hmmm…I will have to admit that I’m an awkward social hugger, but I think that’s more because I’m not much into social hugging in the first place. Stand-offishness would describe my usual attitude to touchy things in public. I’d really rather not, but I am making an effort to become better at these kinds of physical displays of affections because they seem to matter a whole lot to some people I like.
Taking neighbours drink/bread roll at dining table. This is one mistake I do not make. Hooray for me.
Direction of work, decorating/painting rooms. Yep, I do everything from left to right. Painting a room, loading a dishwasher, washing counters or walls. Starting on the right would seem oh-so very wrong.
Being helped to put on a jacket. My husband was left-handed, too, so we were perfectly in-sync when it came to these things. That’s why I married him. Being left-handed meant I was the perfect helper (left-hand woman, perhaps?) on his many projects. I knew instinctively which hand would take the tool I was handing, and he used different hands for different tools in a way that would make sense only to another left-hander. Scissors, for instance, force you to use them right-handed or they don’t cut well. And the guards on many power tools are placed for use with the right hand. When my husband and I worked in the kitchen together, we never got in each other’s way, something I can’t say for the times my daughters and I work together in the kitchen.
Receiving change. It does confuse people when you hold out your left hand for the coins.
Putting children’s socks and shoes on. My kids got used to their parents’ backward ways.
Using your left-hand as a point of reference when giving directions. Well yes, always. Does this make a difference?
Feeling more comfortable sitting on the left hand side of things. If I can, I always sit on the left side. Being on the right of an auditorium or theatre or church discombobulates me. Is this just a left-handed thing, or do righties feel a sense of unease when they sit on the left side of things?
Putting belts on upside down. Huh? There’s a right side up on belts?
Visualise things the opposite way around. I’m not sure. What does this mean, exactly?
Trouble opening/locking locks. Not that I’ve noticed.
Work stations flow the opposite way around. Oooh yes! Since both my husband and I were left-handed, the family computers were always set up tilted for a lefty and with the mouse on the left. It’s another one of those parental quirks the children had to get used to. Right now, on my desk computer, the mouse is on the left and I’ve changed the configuration so that the two sides of the mouse are opposite what they were originally. None of my children has ever grown accustomed to that.
Organising files “back to front”. I’m pretty sure I don’t do this, because if I did, I’d probably know what this means.
Did you know that one of the things associated with left-handedness is the direction of the hair whorl on the back of your head? Right-handers tend to have clock-wise whorls and left-handers’ whorls tend to turn counter clock-wise. This is not always the case, mind you, but it occurs frequently enough that the correlation has been noted by researchers into left-handedness.
My whorl turns counter-clockwise. And I’ve noticed that I part my hair on the right side, while most side parters part their hair on the left. The right side is where my hair parts naturally and I assume that’s related to my backwards whorl direction. What about you? Do you fit the pattern or not?
Being left-handed can make writing more complicated. Lefties often write in an awkward (and painfully slow) over-handed way, or make a mess of things by smearing the ink with their hand. Being taught correct left-handed writing technique can prevent some of the leftie problems, but many teachers don’t know how to help little leftie learners. I am thankful that my mother and my first grade teacher both took the time to learn how to teach me to write as a left-hander should.
If you have a left-handed child, here’s a video that will explain some of the problems your left-handed writer might have and show how you can make writing easier for them.
If you’re a leftie, leave a comment to let me know. If you have lefties in your family, I want to know that, too. And if you’ve done a leftie post on your own blog, please tell me.
More Left-Handers’ Day Blog Posts
Reader Comments (10)
My 8-year-old daughter is a leftie. My dad is a leftie and my mother in law is a leftie.
My dad always insists that he sit on the outside or aisle seat in restaurant booths. Now that our daughter is eight we're realizing that it's most comfortable for us to put her on the outside of the booth so we're not bonking elbows with her.
Thank you for posting the video. I'll have to watch it because I think she's already picked up some bad leftie writing habits.
My almost 3 year old son is left handed and we posted ways to celebrate today on our site- http://peoplesonline.blogspot.com Thanks for your helpful list so I can be aware of challenges he will face and how to help him. Happy Leftie Day!
Hi Sandra. I've added a link to your post. I noticed your son's hair whorl runs counter-clockwise, so he's true to form. :)
One of my brothers is a leftie, and I think he still writes in the over-handed way. When we were kids I always wanted to teach him to hold his pencil differently!
WIth regard to #9: I'm very much a rightie and I always feel more comfortable with the left-hand side. My guess (sheer guess!) is that it doesn't have to do with handedness, but with the fact that I'm very verbal, and English goes left to right. So Left means Where You Start and Right means Go Back to Left.
I'm very much a rightie and I always feel more comfortable with the left-hand side.
The more I think about it, the more I think that handedness has very little to do with preferred sides for sitting. If it did, left sides would tend to be emptier than right, since only one in ten people are left-handed.
I have a leftie son (7-years-old). I enjoyed reading this post! Thanks you!
Sorry I missed this at the time it was posted.
Out of 5 kids, we have 3 (yes, three) lefties. Don't know how it happened. I even asked what the odds were of such an anomaly (or blessed occurrence, depending on whom you ask), but haven't had any takers on that question yet.
Well, they're isn't much evidence that left-handedness is hereditary, so it should be a straight probability thing. I know that 1 in 10 people are left-handed, but at the moment how to translate that into the probability of 3 out of 5 children being left-handed escapes me.
Did you check your kids' scalp whorls?
I checked. As best I can tell, none of the kids have a counter-clockwise whorl (righties or lefties).