Happy Left-Hander's Day!

I'm lefty but probably identify as ambidextrous.

Write, eat, kick with left. Throw with right. Dribble with both. Switch hit.

During the sportswritering days I'd look for lefty rarities such as lefty catchers. Here's a shot from the spring of 2000 showing Fair Haven's catcher. For International Left-Hander's Day that year I put together a cool graphic highlighting great lefty baseball players at each position.

Several years later I covered a beer league softball game and shot a cool moment: lefty pitcher, lefty hitter, lefty catcher.

Which side do you come from?

 

Right hand/right eye dominant.

Bat, golf and shoot (hockey) left, everything else (write, eat, throw, etc) right.

 

Write, eat, serve in tennis, shoot a basketball, shave -- left
Bat, golf, grounstrokes in tennis -- right

 

Growing up, I would bat/throw/write right-handed, BUT ...

... my sophomore year of high school, my right hand got smashed between two football helmets and I sprained my wrist.

At the time, we had a ping-pong table in the basement and I started playing left-handed, because my right hand/wrist was wrapped up in a soft cast. For whatever reason, I could put more English on the ping-pong ball left-handed, so I stuck with it.

Since then, I have shot pool left-handed, played tennis left-handed, learned to switch hit in softball games (left side for contact, right side for power) and now, thanks to various right shoulder injuries, can throw a football left-handed.

Not ambidextrous, but an honorary lefty by necessity.

 

Now that's just weird.

 

Don't ask. I have always thrown lefty and when I learned to hit when I was little, I just imitated my brother (who hits righty). When I played tennis at day camp in grade school, they told us to serve like we threw and hit groundstrokes like we batted. I never had lessons and didn't realize it was strange (and I did a pretty good John McEnroe service imitation). I was barely decent enough to play a little high school tennis (last doubles against the bad schools) and our coach was horrified. He made me try two forehands, but it never worked. It's only a problem when I'm at net and switch hands for an overhead, but otherwise it's not a big deal.

 

Dominant lefty, but none of my four kids are. However, they seem a little more comfortable with their left hand than most right-handers. Particularly my oldest son, who eats left-handed.

 

I'm a lefty. My younger son is also a lefty. My mother in law insists that he must get it from her great aunt.

 

Lefty all the way. Me and Leonardo.

 

I'm left-handed.

My unscientific observations support the finding there is a higher percentage of left-handed lawyers than there are left-handed people in the general population.

 

Doesn't hurt as much writing on legal tablets rather than spiral notebooks???

 

Strengths: increased likelihood of playing pro baseball.

Weaknesses: Profound disgust with lecture hall desks, spiral notebooks and most scissors.