[audioplayer file=”https://admin.rattle.com/audio/HollandsFitness.mp3″]
Every year we’d suit up for the ritual
humiliation. Seven demonstrations
of my inadequacy for the red-
faced phys ed teachers. Pull-ups
were the worst. I’d eke out one then
fall to the ground and look up
from the dirt at the underside
of their clipboards. Girls did
“hang time” instead, and in 4th grade
Laura Lugar hung in there
for hours. Like a banana
on a hook, she thrust her chin
over the metal bar, curled her body
into a crescent and didn’t
budge. We went back to class
and in between decimals and
diagramming sentences the teacher
let us go back outside and have
another look at Laura. In my mind
she’s hanging there still in her yellow
uniform against the black dirt
and the pale of the morning sky.