Being left handed

[miss_mimsy]

One thing that has been part of my Mills Education is the idea of power, privilege, class, and where I fit in and how I can be an ally. This has led me down some very frustrating roads. I think one of the reasons is because no one discusses one challenge I live with everyday and it bugs me that it doesn't matter.

Comments

[nigel_hawthorne]

left handed I am as well. makes for some interestingness when playing instruments, such as the trombone.

[miss_mimsy]

I was forced to play my violin like everyone else, with the bow in my right hand and the strings in my left. I can finger with the best of them, but my bowing has always been sub-par.

I didn't mind when I played flute, but then again, I was old enough that I played it with my left hand at the top, even though that was incorrect.

[shipofools999]

I played the trombone. Can't you just flip the slide to the other side and play it in the mirror position? Since I am a righty, I never tried it but I thought about it. I think I even messed around with it that way as an experiment.

[nigel_hawthorne]

flipping it only works on peashooter trombones. once you get into valves, and bass trombones and all, only one way it works.

[zhaneel69]

Chesh is left handed, but was taught right-handed and so in practice is ambidextrous. He does video games with his right hand because there was no left handed mouse for so long, but writes, draws, cuts, and hammers with his left. But it took him until he was 28 or so before he tried hammering with his left and discovered 'HEY THIS IS EASIER WITH MY DOMINENT HAND'.

What I find interesting, however, is that he is a very interesting mix of right & left brain. He is able to hold wholes of problems in his head and see the shape that others cannot. And yet he can break them down into very simple parts. He is exceeding logical, almost to a frustrating point, but also has leaps of intuition (that he then explains logically).

I think that the ergonomics people have made great strides for left-handers and that many places are more accomodating of lefties than 20 years ago. I, however, never did take into account that you wouldn't necessarily be able to just buy something at the corner market or other considerations.

[miss_mimsy]

Chesh is left handed, but was taught right-handed and so in practice is ambidextrous.

Oh, wow, that is a shame, most schools knew better by then. I had a friend of mine who was forced to learn to write with his right hand. He used to joke that he could write equally bad with both hands.

[zhaneel69]

I get the feeling that it was that it wasn't recognized that he was a lefty rather than a forceful RIGHT IS RIGHT.

Tho maybe his mom...

[labelleizzy]

jeff is a lefty and complains about some aspects of this. He does mouse with his right, though...

my first mother in law was smacked by nuns until she learned to write with her right hand... the pen angle is exactly as it would be if she wrote with her left, and she has the most bizarre loopy handwriting, very unique, but painful-looking.

I agree that this is something worth looking at... if you get a chance to write on privilege and discrimination, this is an excellent example of personal, invisible-to-others experience.

[capnkjb]

Crikey but a lot of people here are lefties!

I have little to add, being a rightie with a definitely subordinate left hand. Like, I can't brush my teeth very well at all with it. :D

Fun story: I remember, when I was a kid, trying to use Mom's left-handed sewing scissors and making a mess out of whatever I tried to cut. This was frustrating, as they were technically one of the sharpest scissors in the house. She's left-handed, see, though since she grew up way back when she got the right-hand treatment and is as a result mostly ambidextrous.

[capnkjb]

Oh shit but I totally remembered something vaguely related!

For a long time I did air guitar and air violin left-handed, probably because it would be a mirror of what I saw. It made learning the bass harrrrrrrd, especially since the left-hand fingers are confused by having to move fast outside of a keyboard or saxophone setting.

What I'm getting at here is, here's a rightie who mimics lefties. Go go Jimi Hendrix hands, away!

[laviolinista]

Thank you Rachel for a wonderfully enlightening post! :)