I don\u2019t know if I would have read the article if it wasn\u2019t called, \u201cWedgies? Or Golden Moments?\u201d But it sure got my attention. <\/p>\n
It was in the Science section (don\u2019t ask me why) of The New York Times, and it was all about a study looking at whether PE classes in school had any effect on how active adults were later in life. In essence, did your experience in gym make you want to keep working out, or running screaming from exercise for all eternity \u2026 and even longer if a tether ball is around? <\/p>\n
The study found a connection between people who liked physical education classes as a kid and went on to find exercise enjoyable in life, and those who thought PE was the coming apocalypse and wouldn\u2019t exercise unless it\u2019s court-mandated. <\/p>\n
The reasons were many: Hating being chosen last or fumbling through games were the negatives, while athletic accomplishment or the thrill of flushing some poor kid\u2019s head in a toilet bowl were the positives. \t<\/p>\n
But I don\u2019t know what to make of the study itself. Because I never saw PE as a net-positive or -negative. It was never that simple. Phys Ed at the Academy of the Holy Names, a Catholic school run by nuns when I attended it for elementary school, was boys-only. They kept the girls safely quarantined across the street where our swine flu and other disgusting habits could not rub off on them.
\n<\/p>\n
My experience in gym was never about joy or misery, but rather something more akin to boot camp. A test of mettle. A survival of the fittest. As close to a living, breathing \u201cLord of the Flies\u201d without being shutdown by the state. <\/p>\n
This was no fault of the school, mind you. But rather the rabid hooligans that we elementary school-age boys had become. Part wild dog, part marauding street gang and part deranged lunatics who believed nothing was funnier or more enjoyable than a red, over-inflated dodgeball propelled into someone\u2019s groin. (Provided that person wasn\u2019t you.)<\/p>\n
What made us like this? And more importantly, how did any of us live long enough to take a survey asking about our days in PE? <\/p>\n
Gym class was just as mental as it was physical. You had to brave the harassing of your comrades as you all changed into PE uniforms (ours were gold shirts and Navy blue shorts) that never fit. They either hung from us like bed sheets, or were so small that they hugged us like a ballerina\u2019s tights. That was never a good look in gold and Navy. <\/p>\n
Worse were the days when you forgot your gym shoes, and had to wear your dress socks with black dress shoes. Not only was the laughter deafening, but you slid around the football field like a fumbling ice skater. <\/p>\n
Are these good or bad memories? Neither. But formative ones. Unforgettable and memorable ones. The sights. The sounds. The bonding. The agony. The pain. The experiences that taught us about winning and losing. Humiliation. Struggle. Adversity. Teamwork. Overcoming obstacles. And how debilitating a shot to the groin by an over-inflated dodge ball could be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I don\u2019t know if I would have read the article if it wasn\u2019t called, \u201cWedgies? Or Golden Moments?\u201d But it sure got my attention. It was in the Science section (don\u2019t ask me why) of The New York Times, and it was all about a study looking at whether PE classes in school had any effect on how active adults were later in life. In essence, did your experience in gym make you want to keep working out, or running screaming from exercise for all eternity \u2026 and even longer if a tether ball is around? The study found a connection between people who liked physical education classes as a kid and went on to find exercise enjoyable in life, and those who thought PE was the coming apocalypse and wouldn\u2019t exercise unless it\u2019s court-mandated. The reasons were many: Hating being chosen last or fumbling through games were the negatives, while athletic accomplishment or the thrill of flushing some poor kid\u2019s head in a toilet bowl were the positives. But I don\u2019t know what to make of the study itself. Because I never saw PE as a net-positive or -negative. It was never that simple. Phys Ed at the Academy of the Holy Names, a Catholic school run by nuns when I attended it for elementary school, was boys-only. They kept the girls safely quarantined across the street where our swine flu and other disgusting habits could not rub off on them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573,562,574],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2018-nutshells","category-childhood","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1795"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1796,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions\/1796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}