It's a funny thing. My junior-high and high school physical education experience is now decades in the rearview mirror, from a previous century, no less. And yet, those memories of 1980s and 1990s gym class are still vivid. Some of the most enduring school memories I have stem from PE.
Admittedly, some of them are good. I was heavy as a teenager, and I didn't play on any of the official school teams. But I was surprisingly good at sports--probably because I had two older brothers, and I always wanted to keep up and compete with them. Out of shape? That I was. But I had my skill sets! And every now and again, I would overcome the gym class nerves and excel. There was the time I played goalie in an indoor soccer game, and there was a substitute teacher that day. I was diving and jumping and making improbable saves. When one shot got through and the other team scored, the sub teacher came up to me and asked my name.
"Mike," I said.
"Well, Mike," he replied. "You can't save 'em all. You were great today!"
Obviously, the positive reinforcement of this stranger, who I'd never see again, resonated with me. I still remember it decades later!
There were other high points, too, scattered through the debris of PE memories, pearls amidst the wreckage.
The trouble was . . . gym class psyched me out. I hated three-quarters of the activities we did. And when we played a sport I wasn't good at, I dreaded making a fool of myself. The instructors, too, always made me nervous. You never knew what they were going to do. One of them even used to loosen his sneakers and kick them at us. Another one would make us do calisthenics for half the period before we played any sports. I usually approached gym class with dread.
Nothing was worse, though, than square dance. Every year, usually in late winter, we'd do square dance for a couple of weeks. The teachers would bring the boys and girls together, line us up opposite each other, and have us choose partners. Well, when I was sixteen, no girl wanted to dance with me. I was overweight and had acne. It was mortifying.
To make matters worse, the teachers would break out an ancient (even for back then) record player. I hated that record player! It was the same music they played every year. I'd have nightmares about it. I can still hear the performer on that record--a guy trying so hard to sound cheerful, telling us to "face your partner," "swing her round and round," and "do-si-do."
There were times when the dance called for us to switch partners midstream, and the girl I was switched to usually rolled her eyes and made it clear she didn't want anything to do with me. I often wished a hole would open up right there in the gymnasium floor, and that I would fall through it straight to the center of the earth.
The gym teachers were oblivious. They smiled and clapped and tapped their feet on the floor. The period would last no longer than forty minutes, but it felt like ten hours. And yet . . . and yet. I welcome these square dance memories. Along with all the other memories from PE that are cringe-worthy and embarrassing. Why? I suppose because they re a part of my life, an aspect of my adolescence. They played a part in shaping the adult I would become, for good or ill.
And maybe (probably), they keep me in tune with being a teenager, with growing up, with the awkwardness and social angst of adolescence. Perhaps memories like these help me to get inside the head of the youthful protagonists I write for. One can only hope!
Also, my next writing project will be a collection of personal essays, a trip down the proverbial memory lane, if you will. I'll be culling and cultivating experiences I had growing up and writing them down. Childhood memories, teenage memories, take us back decades (well, some of us). They consist of events that formed something in us, something strong and enduring, at the core of our being. Remembering them, writing about them, sharing them . . . maybe that can cultivate a feeling of community, of oneness, of togetherness. Maybe that's what writing is, or should be, at its heart.
An outlet available to each of us where we express ourselves, who we are, what we believe, and hope it touches at least one other person who reads it.
Thanks so much for reading!
--Mike
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