The Life of a Lefty
Journalist Dave Wolman '96 reveals the secrets of all things southpaw.
By Brian Eule and the Editors
He could have said no to the electric shock.
Dave Wolman '96 had already enrolled in palm-reading school, practiced descending a castle's circular staircase with a sword (well, a plastic sword) in his left hand, and carefully witnessed with which hands chimpanzees threw dung at each other, all to better understand issues of left-handedness. Wolman could have stopped before a tattooed Ph.D. candidate put a paddle to his head, "zapping" him with an electric shock so that the author might discover—firsthand, so to speak—what parts of the brain correspond to the use of one's hands. But Wolman seems like an all-or-nothing guy, and his yearlong quest to discover all things left-handed, resulting in the book ALeft-Hand Turn Around the World (Perseus, 2005), reveals a new and likable writer with wit, intelligence, and a good sense of adventure.
A lefty himself, Wolman is also a journalist with an insatiable appetite for the arcane, and during the past several years he had painstakingly compiled a rather extensive file containing articles on anything even remotely related to lefties and left-hand tendencies. (Even his father got into the act, sending his son regular e-mail on the topic.) Wolman figured he had to do something about this curiosity, and his solution was to spend a year "chasing the mystery and meaning of all things southpaw," as the cover on his debut book announces.
Yet as he set off to conduct research on the subject, Wolman was also aware of possible pitfalls. He didn't want to write a book that was, as he says, "all about left-handed trivia and kitchen products ideal for left-handers." Instead, A Left-Hand Turn Around the World conveys a strong scientific approach that will allow the layman to better understand the causes and differences between lefties and righties. He also mixes in stories of his own excitement at bonding with others of his kind. "Hey, you're a lefty. So am I," he tells a barber in Japan. "No, it's the mirror," the barber replies. "Ten bucks he tells this story at parties," Wolman writes.
It's this combination of intellectual curiosity with a likable and charming narrator that makes the book most refreshing. "I didn't want to take myself too seriously," admits Wolman, who at one point borrowed his four-year-old nephew to be studied by "southpaw neuropsychologist" Jane M. Healey, to determine if the boy will take after his uncle and be a lefty. "I wasn't keen on writing something that could be easily pegged as just science or just humor."
Now, on his book tour, Wolman finds that his fascination with handedness is catching on, along with that combination of curiosity and humor. At a recent stop at Seattle's Third Place Books, one reader raised his hand to ask the author a question. Wolman called on him. The reader noted, "I intentionally raised my left hand," and asked his question.
As a syndicated columnist for the Providence, R.I., Journal, Mark Patinkin '74 has authored many heart-warming and gut-wrenching stories during an award-winning career that has entered its fourth decade. But none is more gut wrenching—and ultimately heart-warming—than the tale of Andrew Bateson, a Providence youngster who fought a life-or-death battle with bacterial meningitis and then decided that it wasn't enough simply to survive.
Patinkin's book, Up and Running (Center Street, 2005), relays—in exacting detail—not only Bateson's minute-by-minute struggles in a Providence hospital as he hovered between life and death but also the eight intervening years until now, as Bateson and his family struggled mightily with both the physical and emotional aftershocks that nearly tore the family apart.
Yet as the title will attest, the story is ultimately uplifting, as Bateson and his family overcome all manner of adversity. The family is thriving, and Bateson, despite losing both legs, is as active as any other 14-year-old, competing in ice hockey and baseball and tearing around his neighborhood on rollerblades.
Up and Running is part medical drama, part personal saga and comeback story, but above all it is a must-read.
From the writer who brought us 50 Jobs Worse Than Yours ("Book Marks," fall 2004) comes another compendium that should make everyone feel a little better about themselves: 50 Relatives Worse Than Yours (Bloomsbury USA, 2005).
As in his earlier work, Justin Racz '97 has chosen actual people as his subjects (or targets, depending on your point of view). His selection is all encompassing—ranging from characters as frustrating as the "Family E-Mail Forwarder" to as off-
putting as the "Inappropriate Uncle." Each entry contains witty observations that include the subject's motto, his or her secret, and the benefits and drawbacks of having such a relative. (Benefit of the "Shrimp Ring Bringer"? It's better than nothing. Drawback? Actually, it would be better if she brought nothing. $5.99 for 30 shrimp? Be afraid. Be very afraid.")
And guys, if you've escaped Racz's eye so far, don't breathe too easily yet. Coming early this year: 50 Boyfriends Worse Than Yours.
For 20 years, George Matteson '71 operated and captained tugboats from his homeport of New York Harbor, where he had also worked as the waterfront manager of the South Street Seaport Museum. The author of Draggermen: Fishing on Georges Bank, Matteson has now turned his attention to a subject for which he has great affection: the tugboats of New York.
In Tugboats of New York: An Illustrated History (New York University Press, 2005), Matteson has written a love letter, albeit a fact-filled one, to the workhorses of the New York City harbor, capturing the history and iconography of one of maritime's most unsung vessels.
Matteson's book is an exquisite work, featuring more than 150 black-and-white illustrations and rare photographs from the likes of Gordon Parks, one of the world's foremost documentary photographers. Yet what carries the book is Matteson's command of the subject matter. Says filmmaker Ric Burns, who produced the epic PBS series, New York: A Documentary Film, Tugboats of New York is a "brave and jaunty disquisition, copiously illustrated, on the history of tugboats in the port of New York—written with boundless enthusiasm and affection for its subject, and with more than a little longing for the days when ships of all kinds dominated the rhythm of life in and around the city's endless waterways."
Indeed, Matteson relates, "The harbor used to be its own floating world. The 1918 New York census showed 12,000 people living on tugs and barges in the harbor." At its peak in 1929, the harbor hosted 800 tugboats. Now, there are fewer than 60 tugs still working. If Matteson's book is an ode to a dying breed, the worthy tug couldn't have received a better send off.
Recently Published
Olive's Pirate Party (Little, Brown and Company) by Roberta Baker '79
The Canoe Atlas of the Little North (Boston Mills Press, 2006) by Jon Berger '67
The Allegiance of Thomas Hobbes (Oxford University Press, 2005) by Jeff Collins '92
My Special World: Poems and Photographs of Dorothy Forsythe Dale (North Point Press, 2005) by Dorothy Forsythe Dale '43 and edited by Jack Dale
The Force of Desire: A Life of William Bronk (Talisman House, 2006) by Lyman Gilmore '56
Doing Philosophy at the Movies (SUNY Press, 2005) by Richard Gilmore '81
The Big Green Apple: Simple Ideas for Green Living in New York City (Globe Pequot Press, 2005) by Benjamin Jervey '81