What Leftist Nonsense!

(My right hand was amputated when I was a baby. My school isn’t told before I start there as there isn’t really anything I can’t do with one hand. I am eleven years old, on my first day at my new secondary school.)

Teacher: “Can everyone write their full names on their homework planners, please?”

(The class does.)

Teacher: “Can we be doing this with our rights hands, please? We do things properly at this school.”

(We all look up in confusion, then carry on exactly as we were.)

Teacher: *pointing at me* “I said, ‘right hand!’“

Me: *holding up right arm* “I’m sorry, miss, but I don’t have a right hand.”

Teacher: “Stop being silly and write with your right hand.”

(I rotate my arm to show the front and back of my forearm.)

Me: “I’m really sorry, miss, but I don’t have a right hand; it was amputated when I was a baby.”

Teacher: “Then go and sit outside the Headmaster’s office. I will not have your defiance in my classroom.”

(I gather my things and leave, very confused as to what I have done wrong. The Headmaster calls me into his office and I explains why I am there.)

Headmaster: “So, you don’t have a right hand, and were told to use your right hand… which you don’t have?”

Me: “Pretty much.”

Headmaster: “Well, we can tape the pen to the end of your arm, I suppose. Yes, that is better than this left-handed nonsense. You’ll use your right arm from now on.”

(I left his office totally bewildered and used my left hand for the rest of the day with no issues. I told my parents, who reported it to the school governors. The headmaster retired a month later, and the teacher went on maternity leave later in the year and never came back. It wasn’t mentioned again. I wasn’t able to move schools, as no school in the area had a spare place. It was all a bit weird.)