OMG - did we go to the same school?
Small town, Finger Lakes region, (in)famous for its embassy?
But was it a timed mile? Like “Run this in 15 minutes or you’ll have to do it again”?
I was lucky, the female gym teacher took pity on me and didn’t make me rerun it after 6th grade. But that was so embarrassing. I was always the last one and there would always be two gym classes worth of people cheering me on. Even worse when they’d get a few members of the track team to go out and run with me the last few yards in some vain attempt towards encouragement. Sure, it isn’t quite to the level of being beaten up in the locker room, but still absolutely embarrassing.
Last year, our teacher graded us on our ability to actually play the sports. Which we never did get to play. We did drills all the damn time. I got a D in both volleyball and basketball. I’m ok with basketball (I suck, but I vaguely enjoy it), but volleyball is the devil. I have very thin wrists, with nothing but skin and bone in them. They’d always end up red and bruised after gym class.
But then we had health (which I got an A in, because all we had to do was learn) and finally, badmiton. Badmiton was awesome, because we actually got to play, and I eventually got pretty good at it.
I’ve hated gym since kindergarten, though, becuase our gym teacher thought small children should do pushups as a punishment for not doing something else right (not having sneakers, saying something wrong, etc) and also spanked kids on their birthdays. Thank goodness mine is in July.
I actually like dodgeball, though. In 4th and 5th grade, we played boys against girls, and the gym teacher (huge, huge man. He was also a preacher and constantly told us that we needed some “home trainin’!”) played with the girls. So we usually won. And I was good at dodging.
But mostly, gym is evil and it made me hate sports. Which is probably a bad thing.
Wow, looks like this was a cathartic thread for a lot of people. 
Gym was absolutely awful, no matter what grade I was in. In first grade, we jumped rope a lot, and after we jumped rope, we had to fold up our ropes a certain way and put them away. Well, I just couldn’t fold it right, and the teacher would stand by the box to make sure they were all put in right. For some reason, I just couldn’t get it, and she would make me stay there until I did (I never really got it–usually I just did a half-assed job and shoved it in the box when she was distracted.) Every day this happened–I was late to my class after that, which furthered the embarassment. The whole thing culminated in my parents writing a note (:rolleyes: ) to the gym teacher explaining that I just couldn’t tie the jumpropes right and to please excuse me from doing it. She must have thought I was a moron.
Then, in sixth grade, my parents again intervened and decided that I wasn’t going to be allowed to play field hockey or lacrosse (something about balls in the air and my nose breaking, I never asked.) This pissed off my gym teacher incredibly, so not only did I have to read books about field hockey theory, she promised an “alternate fitness plan,” which ended up consisting of running around the field. When you’re 11, nothing sucks more than being singled out, and it was absolutely awful. I remember crying after gym class and begging my parents to let me play lacrosse and field hockey. At that point, I would have taken permanent disfigurement over the resentment of my peers and my horrible gym teacher.
Yuck to gym. 
- although I could never get up the wherewithall to actually hate it.
Boys’ gym in Denmark, in summer, is soccer.
Gradeschool soccer means that everyone who wants to play tries to get possession of the ball and make a heroic run for the opposite goal. Everybody else - i.e. Spiny - stays at an assigned defensive position thinking deep thoughts. If the Brownian motion of the crowd-around-the-ball makes it drift in the general direction of our goal, I’ll get in its way. Easy.
In winter, however! <shudder> All these implements of torture - the horse, the plinth, the rings, the ropes - I failed at every single one of them, being uncoordinated, unfit and after a while, heartily unmotivated.
Which is the one thing a sadistic gym teacher can spot a mile away. Being merely bad at an exercise is accepted with a “Good try…”. Being bad and uninterested is an affront to the gods of bodily exercise and that sin must be atoned for with endless, endless repetitions of your failure in front of your peers. “Try again, a little more power in the jump. No, try again, your hands should be in front. No, try again, jump from your left this time. Come on, try again, hands closer together. You can do better, try…” Why this would instill a sudden interest in gymnastics is a mystery to me. It certainly led to a serious interest in creative excuses.
High school PE was pure bliss in comparison. I still hated most of the activities, but at least noone expected me to pretend to feel any motivation. (And the swimming turned into Snorkeling 101, which was really, really fun.)
That I heartily enjoy running these days is probably because no gym teacher ever tried to kindle my interest in that activity, a fact for which I’m eternally grateful.
Gym class wasn’t all that bad for me, except for swimming. I was always a really fat kid, but big shoulders and all that stuff, so I could carry it well, until I had to take my shirt off to go swimming and show my man-boobs to the whole class that it was obvious. We always had a boys class with a girls class, and played piggyback volleyball, where a girl sits on a guys shoulder as they play water volleyball. When I was in seventh grade the girls class was a ninth grade class. There was a long standing rule that large girls who didn’t want to be seen in a swimming suit didn’t have to show up at the swimming sessions, but all the guys did. So there was this one girl in the ninth grade class who was always my partner because I was the only one able to carry her for that long. I suppose everybody is going to think that I’m going to complain about her being fat, but no that wasn’t the problem. She was gorgeous. About 6’2, nice round ass, huge tits that are the the type a 7th grade dude dreams about. Now you are wondering why I’m complaining about having to carry this girl around? Because I was 14 years old and had an erection the whole freaking time. The game involves a lot of falling off and climbing back on in the process of it she bumped the flag pole many times, and I was so afraid she would notice it, and scream to the whole class about what a pervert I was.
Even worse than that when you are 14 an erection doesn’t give up easily, And of course immediatly after swimming you have to go take a shower with the rest of your class. Needless to say wood in the boys shower is NOT something you would ever want to do unless you feel like fighting for the rest of your life. So I would get out of the swimming poool as slowly as I could and slowly walk toward the locker room always doing something like scratching my knee the whole way so I would seem to have a reason to walk bent over the whole way. Fortunately I figured out that if you take a piss it does go away somewhat (I guess the biological functions cancel each other out) so I would jump into the stall and wait. I got in the habit of drinking about a gallon of water before class just so I would be sure there would be something to piss.
Nobody ever said anything so it was never explicitly embarassing, but horrified me inside o much. As I thought about it years later I realized there was kind a self protection device built into the system. I did notice a couple guys in the shower with wood a couple time, so I’m sure someone noticed mine a time or two. But if anybody said anything, then he would be the guy who looks at dicks in the shower, and would be in as much trouble as you. So it really wasn’t anything to worry about.
I had a horrible time in sixth grade. You see, I got my period the day after I turned 11. Apparently I was the only girl in the entire sixth grade to have gone through this particular rite of passage, and thus the only girl in my gym class to be allowed to sit out. I’d have to agree with the poster who said that the worst thing to a kid that age is to be singled out. The girls would come up to me in the locker room and call me every dirty name they knew. The boys would act as though I was contaminated with some dread substance, making sure to stay many many yards away. To make matters worse, my monthly visit started during gym class, on field day. My coach didn’t even believe me at first. Soon enough though, it was quite apparent. I could kill the dumbass that thought white gymshorts would be a good thing.
I have had many horror stories, but after next Wednesday I will NEVER HAVE TO TAKE GYM CLASS AGAIN!
Two more classes of it until the end of this semester then IT’S DONE WITH!
WOO HOO!!!
(sorry… Just a bit too happy 
)
I hated gym.
First we need a little background to this story.
In school, I was an extreme goody goody. Always obeyed the rules, never talked in class, never ever got sent to the principal’s office or got in any kind of trouble… I was the dream kid. I always obeyed adults because I couldn’t imagine doing anything different.
I hated gym though. I wasn’t particularily overweight or anything, but I was incredibly bad at sports of all kinds and hated them with all my heart. The sport I hated the most, though, was softball. We played it in the spring, which I dreaded.
So one day in, I think, 8th grade, softball time rolled around. I was on the team that was hitting. I was having a bad day and dreading going up to bat. And then… my turn came.
And I snapped. The teacher told me to go up to bat. I sat there and ignored her. She told me again and I continued to ignore her. I just sat there. She finally figured out I wasn’t going to obey, so she sent me to the office to get a referral.
I was pretty upset by this time and was crying a little to myself (I cry veeery easily) but I quickly recovered. I felt like I wasn’t myself at all, like I was a disinterested observer watching from some safe vantage point. Maybe I was in shock. :eek:
In fact, I begin to find it amusing. I, the perfect child, was getting a referral! I was being sent to the office! For refusing to play softball! The TA escorted me to the office and the secretary looked surprised. She made me sit in the chair and I waited. And waited. She just ignored me while time passed. Eventually some other baggy-pantsed teenage male trouble-maker came in and was directed to a desk near mine. He stared at me, I being probably the contender for least likely-looking person in the whole school to be sitting there. He asked me what I did and we both found it very amusing that I was there for refusing to play softball. It was all very surreal.
Eventually, school ended (PE was my last class of the day) and I just left. I think I told my parents, but I can’t remember. I do know that nothing ever came of my referral, as far as I know. Nothing was on my record and my parents were never informed by the school… it was just weird.
Most of the other days were just the kind of low-key, all pervasive misery that makes everything suck.
Hopefully now that I’m in college I will never have to take another gym class again.
Hijack: Vart? What the hell is a vart? It’s a queef. Maybe “queef” is an east coast thing.
I hated gym but I would’ve hated it more if students were forced to take showers after class because I would’ve taken a shower in my underwear or shorts.
I got yelled at in the second grade because the PE teacher had seen me pushing down on my school-issued hoola-hoop after had she explicitly told us not to. She made all the kids circle around me as she fussed, and this girl in my class started calling me stupid (as the teacher did nothing!). I burst into loud embarrassing sobs. The whole world could have exploded right then and I wouldn’t have cared. From that day on, I hated PE with all of my life.
In 8th grade some sympathetic teachers made an end-run around the rest of the administration and put me in an art class rather than make me do 8th grade gym.
In high school, my sophomore year required me do weights. I weighed, at the time, 90lbs. The good thing is that I broke my thumb at the beginning of the semester, and milked that excuse for the rest of the semester.
Once again, the sympathetic gym teacher let me slide, realizing that well, my talents lay in other directions.
I also had my first day of gym in four years–more accurately, weightlifting. Yes, weightlifting.
I’ve decided I’m gonna switch to Dance, which is the same hour. sigh.
I didn’t remember it until today, but I can NEVER get the lockers to open. I mean, never. We don’t have school lockers at my school, so I don’t get any practice with combo locks. I quite simply can’t get 'em open. Grr (luckily, my grandmother teaches at school, so I can keep my gym clothes there, grab them in the passing period before class, and return them after).
We can’t sit out for ‘that time’ either. And the teacher is a guy. You should’ve seen the look on his face when he was telling us all this rule. It would have been funny if I weren’t so disappointed.
To get a diploma we have to have one credit of PE. I’m taking this weightlifting class (or dance if I switch) and then an easy-peasy class called Fit for Life that can unfortunately not be repeated for another credit. And then I’m free!
Because our school’s gym teacher had extremely little imagination, we mostly played a fun little game called “Bombardment” (which I’ve also heard called “German dodgeball”). The rules are simple. Split the class into two groups, place groups on opposite sides of the gym. Roll out two or three half-inflated volleyballs. Encourage the kids to fling the balls at each other. Have fun watching the permanent damage being wreaked!
I saw things in Bombardment that screamed “personal injury lawsuit.” I was standing about three yards from a guy that got hit in the crotch by a ball thrown by a kid who, later on in life, pitched in the minor leagues. The ball screamed in, but instead of the typical “slam,” there was just a real soft [sub]thud[/sub]. I almost lost my lunch just by seeing that. My worst hit wasn’t so bad, I just got hit in the face so hard that my basketball goggles broke.
But Bombardment did provide me with one moment of adolescent humor. One day the gym teacher presented us with the option of Bombardment or playing volleyball with the girls. Another kid and I started to the girls’ side of the gym. One of the annoying kids started razzing me, and I turned to him and said, “Look, either I stay here and have (future minor-league pitcher) chuck volleyballs at me, or I can go over there and watch (a certain large-breasted girl) jump up and down.” The kid thought for a second, then shouted “I’m playing volleyball too!”
Duke, we played that game too, only it was called “line dodge ball”. Because our school was too broke to buy uniform balls, we would use an assortment of nerf balls, red rubber balls, and those cheap plastic balls you can get at the grocery store.
Once we were playing line dodgeball and one of the big boys in the class slammed one of those plastic balls into my face at 90 mph. It seems like everyone in the whole world stopped at the moment, just to see my reaction. I must have looked particularly stunned because the PE teacher–an evil woman–was actually nice and made me relax for the rest of the period. I’m thinking she was scared I was going to sue her or something. I should have for all the abuse she gave me all throughout elementary school. Flat-chested, thick-necked, Tab-drinking WHORE!
I was terribly shy and practically invisible in 8th grade, and my one friend was slightly overweight. Why she respected the P.E. teacher is something I will never figure out.
Anyway, my friend was struggling with her weight, and after class, we approached the teacher, who was holding “court” with all her little popular students. My friend asked “Could you recommend any exercises I could do to lose some weight?”
Bitch P.E. teacher smirks and says, “try pushing yourself away from the table.” :eek:
My poor friend took her seriously at first, then it finally sank in. She ran off to the showers, in tears.
PE wasn’t that traumatic for me, but it sure was violently competitive. I wasn’t particularly athletic, but I was pretty light-footed (from years of running from bullies no doubt) and agile.
Though the worst moments were probably when we were playing ‘water polo’. I put it in quotes because the only thing it had in common with the sport was the ball. Basically, the coach would toss in a couple of water polo balls in with us in the lap pool, and kind of leave us to figure it out. There were no goals, really it was just a big wrestling match in the water; people would take particular pleasure in beaning somebody in the head when they weren’t looking. So between getting beaned multiple times in the cranium, then getting pinned underwater nearly to the point of drowning, yeah, that was pretty unpleasant.
Wrestling also sucked. Now granted I liked the sport in concept, its just horrible when your opponent is 2.5x stronger than you are. Also having the meathead’s elbow jammed against your adams apple, cutting off so much air that you can’t scream to the coach that the meathead is strangling you. Plus, the heaviest guy in class was always about 75-150 lbs heavier than the next guy, which would result in the bigger guy throwing the other guy around the gym like a doll.
Probably the only fun thing that we did in gym was the climbing rope. Now we didn’t climb on it; when the coach wasn’t around we’d swing on it.
We had a ‘small gym’ that had a climbing rope. One person would get on, and start swinging across the gym. The gym was small enough that the person could push off from a wall with their feet and build up quite a bit of speed. Then someone would see this, and jump on! Until you have a mass of 6-7 high school kids clinging to this rope wildly swinging around the gym. Of course, eventually it would it it a wall or an unwary bystander (I feel so sorry for that girl )
Ok, I’m the weirdo. I actually looked forward to gym. Looking back, I still like it.
I was never coordinated or even very strong, but I was tall, fast and crazy enough to fake it most of the time. My horror stories aren’t the psychologically traumatic kind so much as get-carted-off-to-the-emergency-room kind. In junior high, I managed to have my glasses smashed twice by soccer balls to the face (unintentional), twisted my ankle badly enough to make it swell up like a softball, shredded my forearm into a bloody mess, shredded my shins in a bloodier mess, and dislocated my shoulder at least four times. Eventually, I had the teacher so traumatized that when he’d hear me say “uh…, coach?” he’d just cover his eyes and shout “I don’t wanna see it, just go to the nurse’s office! Go!”
Thanks. My wife and I are trying to have a kid and now I’m going to have that image floating through my head. Oh well, I guess I can always dress in a leather/fur tunic and work on my Ricardo Montalban voice.