Monday, March 3, 2008

"Sinistral"

Being left-handed is like being in a secret club. We have our own bizarre initialization rituals, such as learning how to write "the wrong way." We pay our dues every day, in terms of the extra effort that we must make to live in a right-handed world. When we encounter another lefty, we immediately have something in common. The club is shrouded in secrecy, because we rarely mention the topic to our right-handed friends.
For fun, I started making a list of the aspects of everyday life that are geared towards right-handed people. Lefties will probably recognize most things on this list; righties might find some of these things surprising. Anyways, I hope you enjoy reading it! :-)

• We have to use special "lefty" scissors. [I don’t do that.However,I hold my scissor,brush,spoon,etc. with my left hand]
• We write from left to right, so that our hand smears the fresh ink across the page. (Righties' hands do not touch the ink until they get to the next line, so the ink has a few seconds to dry.) [sheesh!Those traumas,during the exam.I’ll write the whole damned thing also so perfectly only to see that the left side of my palm smeared the ink,all over the page.]
• If you grab a coffee mug with your left hand, the picture will be facing away from you. (Righties get to look at the picture while they drink.)
• Lefties have little choice where they get to sit at large dinners, lest they bump elbows with a righty.
[Eveytime!every single time,it looks like an elbow war is going on]
• Lefties have little choice where they get to sit in lecture halls. Often the only left-handed desks are on the end of the row. Lefties can't sit in the middle, unless they want to have a hard time writing.[During every dictation,wither I’ll lose my patience or the person on my left]
• When writing in a 3-ring binder (or spiral notebook), the rings get in the way of our hands when we write on the front side of the paper. (Righties have this problem when writing on the back of the paper, but this is easier to avoid.)
• Many "commonly" used keys are on the right side of the keyboard. For example: backspace, enter, arrows, and numeric keypad.
[in addition to it,nobody stiches the buttons of my school-shirt on the left,so everytime I fumble while putting on the buttons]
• Computer mice are generally set up so that the "main" button is the index finger for righties. If you want to use the mouse in your left hand, the "main" button is under your less-adept ring finger. [I tried real hard on that,I’m sort of ambidextrous now]
• Bike gears are on the right side of the bike. This means that if you carry the bike on your right shoulder, the gears face outward. If you put the bike on your left shoulder, you'll get grease stains all over your clothes.
• Bike helmet chin-strap buckles are easier to release with your right hand.
• Hand-held jigsaws blow sawdust off to the right side. If you hold it in your right hand, it blows the sawdust away from you. If you hold it in your left hand, it blows sawdust in your face.
• Drill presses have the handle (to lower the drill) on the right side. It's impossible (and dangerous!) to try to hold the wood with your right hand while controlling the drill with your left hand.
• Lefties have to get their own "left-handed" boomerangs, golf clubs, hockey sticks, and baseball mitts. This means we usually can't borrow our friends' equipment.
• Car stick-shifts are on the right side of the driver. Less frequently used controls, such as headlight switches, are on the left side.

• High-end headphones (with only one cord) have the cord on the left side. The cord gets in the way more for left-handed writers.
• BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) entrance/exit gates take the ticket on your right side.
• When pants only have one back pocket, it's always on the right side. (Lefties have to fumble around for their wallet with their "bad" hand.)
[thankfully,mine have two backpockets.]
• Mini propane camping stoves are designed so that you can hold it with your left hand and pump up air pressure with your right, even if the stove is still hot. It's hard to hold it with your right hand and pump with your left hand without burning your right hand.
• Piano keys are arranged so the more rapidly-changing higher notes are played with the right hand. For beginners, the base clef (left hand) is often optional.
• Camera shutter buttons are often on the right. Pressing the button with our less-dextrous hand makes it harder for lefties to hold the camera steady while taking a picture.
[yea,sometimes the photos get shaken]
• "Ergonomic" chairs usually have the controls on the right side.
• When firing an automatic or semi-automatic rifle, the ejection port blows casings past your face.
• When holding a pen or pencil in your right hand, you can read any lettering on it, but in your left hand, the lettering is upside-down.[exactly!like almost mirror images]

[Courtesy:Internet]


MY ADDITIONS:

I got pretty famous since the starting of my school life because everytime I was an alien,who gripped the pen in a strange fashion,like curling the whole hand,typically.Sometimes,there are public demands,like:-“Please write my name and show me” , “How do you colour?”, “You write that way?Always?Write it again.” Everytime I passed to another class, the first thing that the class teacher would come know is “About the girl who writes with her left-hand.” They’d get all enthusiastic to make me write with my right hand,to the point of having me practice handwriting daily.When I used my left hand more as an infant,my folks got shit scared[shit scared?i mean wtf?].I was taken to a Dr. to find out if I was normal.I’m dyslexiac,not a schizophrenic either,unlike what most reasearchers point out.I’m just a slow coach,when it comes to writing.I need to make two efforts while writing,not smearing the ink and writing fast.Eventually,I flop. “Stares” of people made me do something against my rule.I eat with right-hand.And me eating is quite a scene.However,when it comes to spoons,I just dunno how to hold it with my right-hand.
But then being a left-hander isn’t bad.It is like feeling,that I’m so different than everyone else,like I’m God’s favourite child,atleast he has made an effort to get me noticed.

2 comments:

anjashi sarkar said...

hey man,that was reallly realllllly cool...

Neeru Iyer said...

JESUS! i agree! bein a left hander myself, i'd understand the highs n lows of left-handedness :D well, my parents were like SHIT-scared too, but im glad they werent THAT scared that they forced me to use my right hand *shivers* i like usin my left hand. n ya, the problem with ink pens. i HATE ink pens, though i write pretty beautifully with them. but wats the use if i end up blotching them anyways?! n ya, my professor once asked me curiously, "wat ll u think when u see a right-hander write with his right hand?" :D [dont ask me wat i answered.]