Rebel Without a Pause

May 12, 2026

I’m not sure how you feel about your left hand. I’ve always had a love hate relationship with mine. 

The damn thing is the James Dean of my extremities.  A digital delinquent. Kinda surly. Full of attitude. A lot of stored up teenage angst lookin for ways to get the rest of the body in trouble.  A rebel without a pause.

If my two hands were brothers, my right hand would be Rudy and my left hand would be Tom. You know…Rich Man, Poor Man?

No?

For you youngsters, Rich Man, Poor Man was pretty much the original miniseries. Binge worthy TV before TV binging was possible…oh, I’d say…50 years ago.  

It’s the story of two brothers born to an abusive father and an adoring mother. Rudy…the preppie in the yellow sweater… was mom’s clean cut, dark-haired favorite: behaved, ambitious, an empty V-neck  destined for a financially successful, but emotionally empty life in a three-piece suit. Tom…the guy in the blue… was angry, a brooding blonde hulk in a Brando like tank top working the docks, boxing for spending money, unable to control his restless ways, but the brother you secretly pulled for.  

Same genetics. Way different outcomes.

Just like my hands. 

My right hand has always behaved. My left…not so much.

I’m not alone in this. Ninety percent of we homo sapiens are right hand dominant. Only one in ten is a lefty. (You know who you are.)

Fun fact? Your righty/lefty percentages differ in our primate cousins. Apes? 75% righties. Chimps? 70% righties. But, interestingly, the orangutang branch of our family is the opposite. They’re 66% lefties.

Another fun fact…the word is not pronounced “Oh-RANG-ah-tang.” It’s actually “Uh-RAWN-goo-tawn.” I had a college professor who went ape shit should anyone say it uhh–rawn-goo-wrong.

Where was I? Oh yeah…back to humans.

Those that can bat both ways? Switch hitters. I mean your truly ambidextrous? 

One in a hundred.

Guys like Leonardo da Vinci, Ben Franklin, Kobe Bryant, and Dan Akroyd. James Garfield, our 20^thPresident, who lasted only 200 days in office, could write in Greek with one hand and Latin with the other, AT THE SAME TIME.

Why, you ask?

I dunno; probably, a parlor trick. Impress the ladies, you know.

Oh, sorry…your question was “Why are most of us righties?” 

Good question. Lots of theories on this.

Apparently, there are two explanations. On the one hand, the thinking is that since the left hemisphere of our brains is where language, speech and complex motor skills hold up and since the left hemisphere controls the right side of our bodies, this promotes a preference for the right hand. 

I’m not sure I get that one.

On the other hand, some scientists think it’s all about tool making. For over 500,000 years we’ve been making tools premised on the notion that the right hand is better at fine motor manipulation and the left hand is good for holding steady whatever it is we’re working on. 

Think of it this way. If the sun is going down, it’s getting chilly and the critters with the big teeth come out at night, our motivated ancestors found a steady left hand was good to hold the stone while the more coordinated right hand delivered just the right whack with the flint to produce a spark to start the fire to scare off whatever it was that wanted to eat us.

Patterned behavior on an evolutionary scale with a motivational chaser.

I get that.

Which brings me…at a speed which I suspect you, dear reader, now find only slightly more expedited than human evolution…back to my own left hand. 

I don’t often ask much of my leftwing malcontent. Never have. 

Hell, Coach Diegleman cut me in the first week of 7^th Grade basketball try-outs because my answer to the left hand lay-up drill was to dribble right handed down the left side of the key, veer  under the hoop at the last second, and execute with my right hand a nifty–no doubt crowd pleasing–scooped reverse lay-up with side spin high off the glass (Apparently, Diegleman failed to appreciate the athletic artistry in this, my signature move,  which I dubbed “The Wizard” and was looking for something more reliable, less flashy). 

Okay Coach, but that won’t pack the RVJH gym on game day. Now will it?

Anyway, ever since I was offered, but declined, the embarrassing “Team Manager” position Coach Bob tossed my way as a consolation prize, it just seemed wise to let my less than dominant hand go more than dormant.

Fast forward fifty years.

The monster has awakened. 

It’s come out of lifelong hibernation and is stirring up all kinds of shit. 

Help Cathy fasten a necklace clasp behind her neck?

Fuhgeddaboudit.

Hold a plate steady so I can spoon on a second helping of fruit salad without grapes and blueberries rolling all over the kitchen floor?

Fuhgeddaboudit.

Hold an iPhone steady so I can type a simple two-word text?

Held no.  I mean, Help No. God damn it…Hell no.

My steady-as-she-goes southpaw has got up and gone AWOL. The only thing it’s good for is drying off a Polaroid photo. (Youngsters…ask your grandparents about that one.)

And [whispering] can I share a little secret?

IT’S PISSING ME OFF.

So, I’ve decided: no more namby pamby patience. No more “What’s eating at you, little guy?” It’s time for some tough love. A good old fashion ass-whuppin, straighten-up-and-fly-right intervention like Tom and Rudy’s dad would have dished out. 

Cue the music from Rocky. 

BONG, BONG, BONG

No, not the post-fight “Yo Adrian” celebration theme.  (Though the part when Mic gives Rocky the green light to switch back to left-handed would be an apt metaphor here.)

No, I’m talking the BONG-BONG-BONG work-out theme.

No, not that one. Not Rocky 1. Rocky IV. You know…when he’s in Siberia and has nothing but frozen tundra farm tools to train for the fight with Ivan Drago. You know…running in knee deep snow, lifting logs, pulling a sled…

Rob, you’ve got 90 days until this damn brain surgery. Just ninety days. Ninety days to find manual dexterity in a hyperactive thumb and fingers that were rebellious even before Parkie’s arrived. You need to work that left hand like Rocky on a speed bag. Or doing one arm push-ups or chin-ups.  Or chasing a chicken.

Some daily task, some seemingly impossible drill, some superhuman regimen, that everyone in  the family will come to Cathy saying, “He can’t do it Cath; it’s only going to break his heart; you’ve got to stop him” and Cathy says to them “I can’t; I just can’t” and then turns to me with a steely look in her eye, like Adrian after she had the baby in Rocky II. 

Remember, when Rocky says, “Listen, if you don’t want me mixin with Creed no more, we’ll make out some other kind of way.” And then Adrian asks Rocky to lean in close and you think she’s going to say “Thank you Rocky; I don’t want you to fight”, but instead she whispers “There’s one thing I want you to do for me…win…WIN!”

BONG, BONG, BONG

But what?

What is something that even people with a steady left hand have trouble doing? Something even lefties have trouble doing. 

Oh no. No, no, no.

Can’t be done Rob. Can’t be done. McCartney and Hendrix started when they were kids and they fretted with their right hands. They strummed with their left.

You’re almost 70 and you have Parkinson’s.  You haven’t played that guitar since Randy Pyle tried to teach you Malaguena in high school. Unsuccessfully, I might add. Bar chords? Memorize the fret board? Scales? Arpeggios? 

BONG, BONG, BONG

What? You  only want to learn the intros to Maggie May? And Dust in the Wind? 

Oh, and maybe Classical Gas? 

With a hyperactive left hand that works, when it works, only in the morning?

Are you crazy?

BONG, BONG, BONG

And what?

There’s more?

Wdya mean…look closer at the photo…?

At what…?

On the music stand?

What on the music stand?

In the middle?

Seriously? An Irish tin whistle?

You’ve always wanted to play one?

Uhh Rob? You do realize you hold a whistle in… your hands, right?

And you use… your fingers… to cover the holes, right?

And if you don’t cover the holes just right it sounds like nails on a chalkboard?

You do? 

You’ve tried it? 

And it does? 

I see.

Have you shared this plan with Cathy?

No?

Don’t ya think you should?

What’s that? You’re planning to practice…in the mornings…when your fingers work better?

Uh huh.

And when she’s at her mom’s?

I see. 

What about the neighbors, Rob?

You’ll shut the windows…gotcha.

I’m just spit balling here, Rob. But…uhh…isn’t it kinda late in the game to tackle something new?

Yeah, well, that’s true. If the brain overhaul works, the improvement could be pretty dramatic. Can’t argue with you there.

And what?

What better way to measure success than a before and after video?

I suppose, but don’t you think you’re putting a wee bit too much pressure on yourself. A little Irish cart before the horse?

No?

What’s that?

Your dad always wanted to play the recorder?

I see. 

Did he?

No?

But he always planned to.  I see.

What was that?

Your dad always said…what?

Yeah, I suppose that’s true…

“What’s the worst that can happen…”

“…and is that really soooo bad?”