Living the laborious leftie life
By Jordan Blum
Skiff Staff

Being a white male from a middle-class suburban family, it’s always been hard to distinguish myself from the norm — to really be able to stand out in some way.

My left-handedness has always put me in a small minority of less than 10 percent of the population and given me some sense of identity. Coming from a family where I was the only left-handed person added to this unique quality I was born with.

First of all, my predominant arm has given me my career path. Fifty percent of the world is considered creative and 40 percent of that creative half is, as if you hadn’t figured it out, left handed.

As a journalism major, one can only assume my inclinations toward creative writing are directly related to my right brain, and left hand. Who wants to be a boring business major and earn lots more money (no offense to half the guys on campus) when you can have fun with your career and have the freedom of self-expression.

Of course, growing up in a minority has its share of difficulties as well. The worst part has to be trying to use scissors. Sure, it looks simple enough, but watch me try to cut paper with a regular pair of scissors if you want a good laugh. It seems like God’s own little personal practical joke on lefties.

Also, sitting at the dinner table is always a chore as well. It gets pretty repetitious throwing elbows at people every time a right-handed person sits directly to my left. This is especially difficult when trying to eat foods like pasta (wait for the visual).

On another note, being a lefty helps in the sporting world. In basketball, people are less ready for you to dribble drive to the left, and in baseball, southpaw pitchers are always at a premium. Personally, being a lefty helped me learn to switch hit just as well as I could hit from the right side of the plate. Of course I only batted .200 as a lefty anyway, but it helped me confuse the pitcher and secure a few more walks.

So, as a whole being a lefty is definitely a virtue. Sure you right-handed people can laugh it off, but all of you know you’re secretly jealous of the left minority.

Now if we can only get rid of those annoying left-handed desks that not even us lefties like because we grew up sitting in the regular ones.

Opinion Editor Jordan Blum is a junior broadcast journalism major from New Orleans.
He can be contacted at (j.d.blum@student.tcu.edu).

credits

TCU Daily Skiff © 2002