The Locker Room
Christina Hamlett
October 08, 2006
Was there ever a concept so dreadful in the teenage vocabulary as “Gym Class”? Years later, I still cringe at the sound of it - the conjured memories of ugly uniforms, communal showers, and being picked last for virtually every team sport.
Even worse, I was cursed by the lotto gods for consecutively winning 4 straight years of P.E. as my first-period class. No matter the physical activity involved - but most especially swimming and field hockey - it was all geared to wreak havoc on whatever hair and makeup efforts I had painstakingly engaged in prior to catching the bus.
No wonder I spent most of those 4 years dateless.
The outfits we wore - an unflattering combination of scratchy green cotton and elastic - were nothing less than appalling. We also had to embroider our names exactly one and one quarter inches above the left hand pocket to not only thwart locker-room theft but enable the instructors to call on us to do stuff that no one in her right mind would ever have volunteered for. The over-achievers embroidered their names in gold thread and added a colorful border of perky flowers and birds. Everyone else - much like me - used a waterproof black felt pen and hoped no one ever looked really close enough to discover the deception.
The only deviation in our athletic wardrobe came from the requisite six weeks of modern dance, led by the rather – uh - corpulent Miss Miller. For dance, we were allowed to wear basic black leotards. So did she, although ours fit much better, having not been subjected to years of dramatic lunging, expressive arm sweeps, and regular forays to the teachers’ lounge for glazed doughnuts. Tractors could have driven through some of the gaping holes at her armpits and thighs.
Still, she had passion for what she was doing. I often wondered whether opportunity had ever come knocking on Miss Miller’s door and that, sadly, she had missed it that day because she was off chasing an ice cream truck.
In retrospect, I recall she also had a somewhat disturbing fascination with watching her nubile young students take showers. Not that any of us gave it much thought back in the 60’s. Lesbians, as far as we knew, hadn’t even been invented yet. No, we were far too busy laughing at her gallumphing around the stage to the strains of “Claire de Lune” and wondering what her landings were registering on the Richter Scale.
Her fellow instructor was the polar opposite - a tiny, birdlike woman named Mrs. Munson, who had been wearing the same powder-blue warm-up suit ever since the Truman administration. She also wore a giant silver whistle around her neck which she was fond of blowing, primarily because she would have had a hard time getting any of us to pay attention to her without it.
We never did find out whether there was a Mr. Munson in the picture, but I frequently imagined her following him around the house and tooting at him.
Suffice it to say, I might have enjoyed the high school athletic curriculum more if I had ever divined a useful purpose to it. Getting tired, sweaty and bruised for an hour every day was not my idea of a good time. Obviously, unless I was contemplating a career in the military, the circus, or as a Hollywood stuntwoman, the majority of the rigorous paces I was being put through would never be revisited in my entire adult life.
Such observations usually came to me as I was dangling ungracefully from a thick hemp rope high above the gym floor and wondering why I didn’t have a net. Did our parents know the kind of torture we were being put through? Did the school carry enough insurance to cover limb-breaking mishaps and comas? Was the rope durable enough to withstand that much weight on a regular basis?
Such were the worries that plagued me every day as I inched my way up to the ceiling. That, and wondering how such skills were actually graded. Was it speed? Was it poise? Was it not screaming out loud if you slipped a notch and got rope burn on both palms?
Mrs. Munson had missed her calling as an army drill sergeant. She was determined, I think, to turn all of us into lean, mean, fighting machines. Why else would we be climbing ropes, vaulting over assorted obstacles, and learning to throw a softball as if it were a grenade? My protests that I was planning to grow up and be a famous - albeit sedentary - writer fell on deaf ears, a condition no doubt acquired from decades of blowing that silly whistle.
My well rehearsed arguments that I didn’t think I really needed to master the parallel bars or the balance beam only succeeded in getting me extra laps around the track.
Miss Miller was just as zealous in her own agenda to shape our personalities, specifically to inject purposeful remarks about The Evils of Boys. “They’re only after one thing,” she warned. We all, of course, already knew what that “thing” was: it was to deflower the entire sophomore Girls’ Glee Club by graduation.
Still, the woman opened occasional windows of trust by allowing such co-ed pursuits as square dancing, golf, and archery. You can be sure, of course, that for such a thinness-challenged person, she could move with remarkable speed and agility across any distance to break up anything that remotely resembled flirtatious behavior.
The absolute worst memory of PE, however, was the deflating repetition of always being picked last for a team.
We had to take her the last time,” one of the captains would groan in a most unsportswoman-like manner. The other one would angrily stomp her foot and argue that she’d rather play with one person short than have to take yours truly.
All in all, such unkind comments were not particularly conducive to making me want to play my best, even if I were capable of it.
Put me out in left field and I was far more likely to go wandering off or sit down on the grass under a tree and read a good novel than to catch anything that came my way in the course of the game.
Mrs. Munson or Miss Miller usually had to intervene during the team-picking drill, which not only lowered their already diminishing popularity but made me feel about as welcome as a root canal as I trotted out to join my grumbling team-mates on the field.
I couldn’t run. I couldn’t throw. I couldn’t catch. I couldn’t hit. Have I left anything out?
Had they wanted someone to write breathtaking commentary about the game or interview the winning captain, of course, I could have aced it.
Even worse, I was cursed by the lotto gods for consecutively winning 4 straight years of P.E. as my first-period class. No matter the physical activity involved - but most especially swimming and field hockey - it was all geared to wreak havoc on whatever hair and makeup efforts I had painstakingly engaged in prior to catching the bus.
No wonder I spent most of those 4 years dateless.
The outfits we wore - an unflattering combination of scratchy green cotton and elastic - were nothing less than appalling. We also had to embroider our names exactly one and one quarter inches above the left hand pocket to not only thwart locker-room theft but enable the instructors to call on us to do stuff that no one in her right mind would ever have volunteered for. The over-achievers embroidered their names in gold thread and added a colorful border of perky flowers and birds. Everyone else - much like me - used a waterproof black felt pen and hoped no one ever looked really close enough to discover the deception.
The only deviation in our athletic wardrobe came from the requisite six weeks of modern dance, led by the rather – uh - corpulent Miss Miller. For dance, we were allowed to wear basic black leotards. So did she, although ours fit much better, having not been subjected to years of dramatic lunging, expressive arm sweeps, and regular forays to the teachers’ lounge for glazed doughnuts. Tractors could have driven through some of the gaping holes at her armpits and thighs.
Still, she had passion for what she was doing. I often wondered whether opportunity had ever come knocking on Miss Miller’s door and that, sadly, she had missed it that day because she was off chasing an ice cream truck.
In retrospect, I recall she also had a somewhat disturbing fascination with watching her nubile young students take showers. Not that any of us gave it much thought back in the 60’s. Lesbians, as far as we knew, hadn’t even been invented yet. No, we were far too busy laughing at her gallumphing around the stage to the strains of “Claire de Lune” and wondering what her landings were registering on the Richter Scale.
Her fellow instructor was the polar opposite - a tiny, birdlike woman named Mrs. Munson, who had been wearing the same powder-blue warm-up suit ever since the Truman administration. She also wore a giant silver whistle around her neck which she was fond of blowing, primarily because she would have had a hard time getting any of us to pay attention to her without it.
We never did find out whether there was a Mr. Munson in the picture, but I frequently imagined her following him around the house and tooting at him.
Suffice it to say, I might have enjoyed the high school athletic curriculum more if I had ever divined a useful purpose to it. Getting tired, sweaty and bruised for an hour every day was not my idea of a good time. Obviously, unless I was contemplating a career in the military, the circus, or as a Hollywood stuntwoman, the majority of the rigorous paces I was being put through would never be revisited in my entire adult life.
Such observations usually came to me as I was dangling ungracefully from a thick hemp rope high above the gym floor and wondering why I didn’t have a net. Did our parents know the kind of torture we were being put through? Did the school carry enough insurance to cover limb-breaking mishaps and comas? Was the rope durable enough to withstand that much weight on a regular basis?
Such were the worries that plagued me every day as I inched my way up to the ceiling. That, and wondering how such skills were actually graded. Was it speed? Was it poise? Was it not screaming out loud if you slipped a notch and got rope burn on both palms?
Mrs. Munson had missed her calling as an army drill sergeant. She was determined, I think, to turn all of us into lean, mean, fighting machines. Why else would we be climbing ropes, vaulting over assorted obstacles, and learning to throw a softball as if it were a grenade? My protests that I was planning to grow up and be a famous - albeit sedentary - writer fell on deaf ears, a condition no doubt acquired from decades of blowing that silly whistle.
My well rehearsed arguments that I didn’t think I really needed to master the parallel bars or the balance beam only succeeded in getting me extra laps around the track.
Miss Miller was just as zealous in her own agenda to shape our personalities, specifically to inject purposeful remarks about The Evils of Boys. “They’re only after one thing,” she warned. We all, of course, already knew what that “thing” was: it was to deflower the entire sophomore Girls’ Glee Club by graduation.
Still, the woman opened occasional windows of trust by allowing such co-ed pursuits as square dancing, golf, and archery. You can be sure, of course, that for such a thinness-challenged person, she could move with remarkable speed and agility across any distance to break up anything that remotely resembled flirtatious behavior.
The absolute worst memory of PE, however, was the deflating repetition of always being picked last for a team.
We had to take her the last time,” one of the captains would groan in a most unsportswoman-like manner. The other one would angrily stomp her foot and argue that she’d rather play with one person short than have to take yours truly.
All in all, such unkind comments were not particularly conducive to making me want to play my best, even if I were capable of it.
Put me out in left field and I was far more likely to go wandering off or sit down on the grass under a tree and read a good novel than to catch anything that came my way in the course of the game.
Mrs. Munson or Miss Miller usually had to intervene during the team-picking drill, which not only lowered their already diminishing popularity but made me feel about as welcome as a root canal as I trotted out to join my grumbling team-mates on the field.
I couldn’t run. I couldn’t throw. I couldn’t catch. I couldn’t hit. Have I left anything out?
Had they wanted someone to write breathtaking commentary about the game or interview the winning captain, of course, I could have aced it.
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