I also can't recite the Pledge of Allegiance or cut paper in a straight line 

I have a confession: I'm 23 years old and I don't know right from left.

I mean, I know conceptually what is right and what is left. I realize that if I hold up both my hands flat with the thumbs sticking out, one of them will make an L, and that's the left one. But functionally...it doesn't work out that smoothly.

Today at work I've been paginating, which involves a lot of telling the computer if a page is a right-hand page or a left-hand page, so the footer and tab can go on the correct side and not get sucked into the gutter of the book. It should be relatively easy to remember: even-numbered pages are left, odd are right. Page 467? Click on "SoloArtRight." Cake.

Yeah, no.

EVERY TIME I change a page, I have to mentally refer to my hands to remember which way is left and which is right. When I tried to make an example of page 467 above, I had to correct what I'd orignally typed: "SoloArtLeft." That's what I get for not referring to my fingers.

This whole phenomenon gets even worse when I have to give or take directions. I finally told my friends that they had to pay attention to the gestures I make with my hands while giving directions, because it's a damn good bet that if I say, "Turn left here," I'll actually jerk my thumb to the right and give you a confused look when you get into the left turn lane. I use the phrase "Your other left" frequently. I've nearly wrecked my own car more than a few times making abrupt lane changes after somebody says, "No, I said right, dumbass."

I'm not sure if there's some disconnect between my brain and my mouth that is impeding the comprehension process, or if I didn't watch enough Sesame Street as a toddler, or what.  I think it might be a function of my larger problems with spatial thinking—the problem being that I can't do it. I know a half-mile is the distance from my house to my mailbox, but if you asked me to look down a random street in Houston and estimate what half a mile is, I'm likely to give you a location that's 500 feet away, if I don't offer one that's three miles down the road. I can't tell you how much water a container holds, I can't figure out my route on a map without turning the map so it is going in the same direction I am, i.e., if I am going west, I have to turn the map so west is at the top. And even then, I'm likely to make a right left right turn when I want to go south.  

Yes, I'm dumb. I know.