On top of everything else that’s slid slowly down the family tree and into my genetics - baldness, a smaller stature, a massive head, a honking great slap of neurodiversity - I am also left-handed. Maybe that one isn’t genetics; both my parents are dull old righties, as is my sister. Only my brother strayed from the path, and that’s probably because he idolised me when he was a toddler. Kids grow up and see sense though, don’t they; he stopped idolising me about 25 years ago.
I have no idea how I became left-handed, I can’t remember that far back. I was apparently a gifted child (shut up, it’s true) and I have always delighted in confounding expectations, so I probably just decided to do it for shits and giggles one day. Snotty little gobshite toddler Holmes thinking that this life was a doddle and he needed more obstacles to contend with. My kingdom for a time machine; I’d scare that precocious little brat right sided in a fucking second.
The 13th of August is International Left Handers Day. I didn’t even realise it at the time, probably because I can’t read my stupid designed-by-a-rightie-calendar. Research suggests that approximately 10% of the population is left-handed. So let’s celebrate that glorious minority by highlighting all those times that the World of the Right has done us over.
If you’re one of the many Normo Rightie Oppressors, do you even remember learning to tie your shoelaces as a nipper? Probably not. And that’s probably because it was an art that you mastered in a day or two. A load of flannel about bunny ears and going round the tree and into the burrow and boom! you were good to go, weren’t you? Clarks’ finest on your plates1 and off out the door to scab those knees right up.
Yeah, well now imagine that the bunny ears belonged to a leporid driven to madness by myxomatosis, scampering around the warren trying to fight everything. General Woundwort without the sensible advisers. That’s a right-handed parent teaching a left-handed child the fucking bunny ears method.
My mum tried, with infinite patience, for days. She finally tapped out, unable to teach her southpaw spawn the simple act of tying his shoelaces. Did you yearn for failure at such a young age, mother? Well here he is, traitorous fingers utterly flummoxed by shoelaces.
“Just put the bunny ear through the burrow, Lewis!”
What bunny ear? What burrow? This string is cursed.
My dad tried his unique blend of bribery and fierce cajoling to no effect (and he’d done so well during the Great Stabiliser Wars of 1983, too). I just couldn’t get it. He might as well have sat me down with a carburettor and told me to get the family car back on the road. They decamped to the kitchen, probably opened a bottle of Lambrusco, and contemplated the cack-handed future of their firstborn. Could he become a successful human being if he walked the earth in sandals forever? Jesus did alright, didn’t he? Yes, Malcolm but Jesus could do miracles!
Their frustration was palpable but you can’t really get mardy with a five-year-old because his right hand is an uncooperative gimp, can you?
Some time later, a friend of my mother’s sat me down to do the whole bunny ear thing. I doubt that I groaned inwardly, I didn’t gain my powers of cynicism that young, but I definitely wasn’t sure about going through this rigmarole all over again.
This woman, this angel sent to walk the earth amongst you mere mortals, had hands that moved deftly and clearly and with not a bit of confusion. When she talked about rabbits going round trees and down holes, I no longer stared blankly. I could see it all as clear as day. After about 10 minutes, I tied my shoes. My guardian angel was a leftie, and if not for her I’d probably still be wearing shoes with velcro fastenings to this day.
The Battle of the Bunny Ears was my first object lesson in this hateful, right-sided world. A world where every kitchen utensil, every book, every bit of sporting equipment, every writing implement, every motor vehicle, every musical instrument and every single fucking doorway was designed with someone else in mind. A world where even the most basic of tasks seemed like it had been set by John Kramer out of the Saw franchise working with a spectacular hangover.
“Hello, Lewis. All day you have longed for baked beans, well now you must earn them. If you’re so hungry for baked beans, you won’t mind shredding your hands to ribbons using this right handed tin opener, will you? Open the tin of beans before the toast is burned, Lewis, and you will eat. Fail, and frustration will consume you.”
When I was eight or nine, I had a middle school teacher who was so affronted by my left-handedness that I’m pretty sure I caught her a few times forking the sign of the evil eye my way. That’s a bit off, isn’t it? I was a bit of a gobshite but there was no need for hexes.
This protector of children was the first person to tell me that the word ‘sinister’ originally meant left. She was so old that I could entirely imagine her carrying out that original translation before spending the intervening centuries fighting a crusade against all those horrible left-handed children out there. And now I was in her righteous crosshairs. For a week or so, she set about trying to cure me. She never used those words but that is exactly what she was trying to do.
She sat next to me one day and said “We’re going to teach you to write properly.”
Corporal punishment might’ve recently been banned but apparently this demon hunter was still okay with a bit of psychological torture.
She took hold of my left hand, which was curled into a protective claw around my words, and straightened it into an unnatural, almost painful position.
“Now, write properly,” she said.
I wrote diagonally up the page and she looked at me like I’d just defiled a holy manuscript.
She tilted my page so it matched my new angle of attack. “Write properly, Lewis,” she said.
I wrote horizontally across the diagonal page.
She gripped my frail little left hand in her strong, wizened, witch’s talon of a right and told me for a third time to write properly. And I was supposed to be the sinister one in this equation?
My hand cured protectively around the words and the drunk spider stagger spewed from my Berol Papermate. I have written like that ever since.
This was middle school, no lesson went on for more than an hour. Yet my memory is that she kept torturing me for an entire day: a twisted Father Merrin desperate to drive the left handed devil from this innocent child. Joke’s on you dear, you may have corrected children in the Soviet Union and successfully ‘cured’ George VI of left-handedness2, but I have always been a stubborn little shit.
Sometimes I wish that evil middle school teacher had won. If you’re reading this on Substack, you’re probably a writer. Look at your notepad. Lovely, isn’t it? Get an idea, scribble it down, bosh. Now imagine your favourite notepad brutalising your writing hand every time you jot down some inspo. Yeah, that’s being left-handed.
In my days waiting tables, I used to dread anything more than a four top. I could just about make four orders work, anything more than that and I was taking notes, notes that would be smeared but my dominant hand dragging across the page like a wounded animal. Was that a margarita or a mojito? It’s in the (left) hand of the gods, now.
The worst thing The Muse can say to me is “Have you written the card yet?” Six little words that send shivers down my spine. Because no matter who the card is for, be they friend, foe or actual blood relative, they will get a smeary salutation. If I’m lucky, I’ll remember at the last minute and use the envelope as a protective barrier.
I’m not 100% leftie. I kick right footed, hit right handed, and on my all-too-brief forays into summer sports, I have been fully right sided. When I briefly played the bass in a garage band, I just copied Duff McKagan and slung that bad boy over my right shoulder. I’ve started learning piano recently, and I’m happy to tell you that both of my hands are equally clueless.
I’ll often spout off that I’m ambidextrous, but that is porky3 so huge it would open up a sinkhole that would consume Melton Mowbray. To be ambidextrous is to be equally adept with both hands. I am equally naff with both. Ambiclumsy, if you will.
Take tools. No, literally take them; take them away because I can’t fucking use them. “Hammer in that nail, Lew.” Sure, okay. Left hand’s got the precision but right hand’s got the power. Neither of them is capable on their own, so now I’m holding a £6 Ikea ball pein like I’m a fat little Thor and hoping for the best. At least all of my thumbs are out of the way. Sawing a bit of wood? Fuck off mate, I’d sooner attempt to split an atom.
It’s not just saws. Scissors, knives, golf clubs - all designed for righties. It’s actually dangerous being left-handed. I suppose I should be glad that I’m in civilised Blighty; if I was a Yank there’d be guns laying around everywhere and I’d be even more dumbfounded and dangerous. “Don’t shoot officer, I’m not a spree shooter, I’m just a leftie! No, not that sort of leftie!” BLAM BLAM BLAM!
Thanks for reading. My ego is gigantic but dead fragile, so show some love before you scarper. Bang that like button on your way out, or get involved in the comments if this piece landed well with you. If you’re feeling really flush, buy me a beer and I’ll love you forever. Cheers.
Plates of meat = feet.
I could’ve honestly believed she was personally responsible for that.
Pork pie = lie.
Fellow leftie here! The best part was that my best friend at school was also a leftie and to prevent us bumping elbows with our right handed oppressors, we had to be sat together at all times. I took that as a small win!
Another great read, Lewis and ugh! What a horrible teacher.
The whole shoelace thing tapped into one of my most legendary pet peeves. They are such an obstacle for so many people - including me and my kids - but they are absolute nonsense. I just don't get it. Humanity has put people on the moon. We can remotely land a drone on an asteroid while both are hurtling through space at terrifying speeds. Why are we still expecting each other to fasten footwear with disgusting pieces of string that come undone and drag on the floor of public toilets?
Velcro, mate. Velcro all day long, and twice on Sundays. ;)