When Left's All Right!

What does the man who created the Mona Lisa, the man who invented Alternating Current, the greatest comedian of the 20th century, the founder of Microsoft and the musical genius of Austria all have in common? Little, apart from the fact that they were all considered the best minds of their time in their field and...were left-handed. Besides Da Vinci, Nikola Tesla, Charlie Chaplin, Bill Gates and Mozart, other well-known lefties include Helen Keller, Brad Pitt, Amitabh Bachchan, Buzz Aldrin, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Indian PM Narendra Modi and a host of US Presidents! The list simply goes on...

While I am no Tesla, one of the first things people notice about me is the fact that I am left-handed. Failure to immediately take note of this anomaly is almost certainly met with a nonplussed look and an exclamation of "I didn't know you were a leftie!". While this makes me (and fellow lefties) stand out in a crowd of people who have no problem handling their scissors while cutting a packet of milk for their morning cup of tea or dressing up in cute shirts (or anything with buttons!), it comes with a more than fair share of challenges (as you might have guessed by now). So much so that we have an entire day in a calendar of 365 (or 366) days dedicated in recognition of our everyday maladroit adventures! Mind it, we are not clumsy because we are left-handed, rather we live in a world made for right-handers which makes it a little weird for us to get around. Before I complain too much, let's check out a little poem this leftie wrote -

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As I write, I smudge my hand

A culprit only to me, the spiral's rand!

They eat fine and I eat fine

Yet, stares I get, making me feel like swine!

In class, I sit with my friends

While we write, I gotta sit at the end, or make amends!

Oh, maybe I could sit in the desk, a one-seater

Alas! That is a bigger bummer!

In Art class, I see them snip

As I cut, myself I nip!

They tell me, I look chic in a shirt

Heaven knows how much the buttoning hurt!

No, life ain't easy for the left-handed

We are often left feeling stranded!

Yet, we do get along okay

Fellow lefties, attend to our Maydays!

But life ain't all dull, this 'quirk'

makes the 'Right world' awestruck!

And in a little limelight we revel

Maybe that makes our languish a little level!

We do thank our right-handed buddies

For their little sacrifices, legit!

For, a world full of lefties

Ain't 'right' either, is it?

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While I wanted to explore the struggles of a left-hander from their perspective, I knew it would be incomplete without thanking the right-handed community for helping us out whenever we need it! While all parents who teach their kids to write for the first time deserve appreciation, a special shoutout goes to the right-handed parents (like my mom) who had to struggle to hold the left hand of their little one with their own right hand as their daughter (or son) wrote their first words, without making the easier choice of forcing the child to become right-handed, though this still happens! Try doing this with a friend, and you will see why it is difficult. Not just in the early years of a leftie's life, our right-handed buddies do their bit in helping us adjust in a right-dominant world even later in life, be it the friendly classmate who didn't mind the elbow bumps as much, or the good soul who was kind enough to lend a 'neutral' scissor when you had only 'right-handed' ones.

Even enjoying your favourite cup of tea is not as simple as it sounds, at least not for a leftie, cups are designed for right-handers and holding it in your left hand is suicidal for the fancy clothes you are wearing, as you would be sure to spill if you try to hold the cup by its ear.

All that said, being left-handed has amazing advantages too! While there are trivial ones like the additional attention you get and answering the genuinely curious questions people have about you and your 'superpower' (next time you look at a leftie incredulously, know that this is probably what runs in their mind), I am talking about serious ones like having an advantage over an opponent in a game of badminton or any other sport that involves significant usage of one hand and finding it relatively easy to be ambidextrous. Studies also show that lefties tend to have higher IQs and are better are decision-making. Also, disproportionate to our low population of 10% of the 8 billion people on earth, (the global percentage has remained steady around 10% for millennia - evolution at play), there have been a higher number of famous, powerful and successful lefties in all spheres of life.

Having said that even if you are not Da Vinci or Angelina Jolie, you are probably lowkey famous in your circle for your 'quirk'! Here's wishing every leftie a Happy Left Handers' Day from a fellow leftie!

If you are not a leftie, share it with your left-handed friends, not only will it make their day, but it will help you understand the poem better (only if you already didn't!). #InternationalLeftHandersDay #LeftieWrites