Believe it or not, this isn’t my real job. I was hoping that by writing a blog, I could earn enough money to buy fancy cars and a big house, but the truth is, I’m lucky if I can buy a burger for lunch. My real job is teaching fifth grade to a bunch of squirrely kids. And that, my friends, is where this week’s story begins.
As a teacher, I often try to motivate my students by joining them in their quest for knowledge. Last week, I applied this logic in the area of physical education. You have to understand, I am a thirty-something guy who runs on a regular basis to stay in shape, so when I decided to run with my class, I never considered that the thirty-something part could actually cause pain. A two hundred yard sprint didn’t used to seem that long to me. After all, I can run (“slowly” apparently is the key here) four miles and hardly break a sweat.
To make matters worse, I gave the class a 50 yard head start and tried to catch up. During that mad dash, I was successful in passing many of the huffing and puffing students. There is one student in particular, let’s call her Blondie, who likes to challenge me. So, as I was hiding the fact that I was gasping for breath, she says to me, “Bet you can’t do 20 push-ups.” Not one to refuse a challenge from a ten-year-old girl, I hit the ground. Twenty push-ups later, I popped up and yelled to the class, “Let’s do it again!” And off we went. I beat them all this time, although one particularly fast guy gave me a real run for my money.
In case you are keeping track, that is now four hundred yards at a full sprint and 20 push-ups in between. Even though I was on the verge of death at the moment, I was feeling pretty good. At least I could run that far and not need an oxygen tank like those wimpy NFL players who run 80 yards then retreat to the sidelines to suck pure oxygen for ten minutes. No, I took my punishment like a man. Fortunately for me, as my punishment was becoming more severe, the bell rang and I sent the kids home. Staggering back to my classroom, I felt as if my heart would pop out of my chest. I was sucking in air, but there just didn’t seem to be enough to sustain my rapidly fading life.
It gets worse. One of my students has an older sister who is considering a career in teaching. As a high school project, she had to interview someone in her anticipated profession. Bet you can’t guess who she picked and where she was waiting when I got back to my classroom. By now my head is spinning and lunch is fighting to stay inside where it belongs. I can’t recall another time in my life when I have felt this close to blacking out. She starts asking questions. I sit down. More questions. I head back outside, maybe there is some air there. More questions. I can’t go on. After telling her that I just might lose my lunch any second, I did my best to ask her to e-mail me the questions. Fortunately, she had my e-mail address because it is really long and I don’t think I could have remembered it at the moment.
Finally, I was alone and the floor was calling. I didn’t care how I got there, just as long as I was there in less than a second. By now I was swearing off running for the rest of my life. Cell phone. The thought crossed my mind that I had better let someone know where I was in case I couldn’t get back up. The door was open and I was half hoping that someone would find me sprawled out all alone on the floor of a classroom. The other half (the manly half) wanted to deal with my agony all alone. Then my arms went numb. The push-ups. I should have skipped the push-ups. Darn that Blondie.
Lesson learned: Never again will I try to get my thirty-something body to do things that only a ten-something body (or an Olympic athlete) has any business doing.
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