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I told my jr. high-school principal to ‘go to H***.’ I didn’t mean to [1]

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Date: 2023-09-28

Back in 7th grade smack dab in the mid-1960s, I didn’t have a care in the world and junior high school was a blast. There were some differences from elementary school like changing classes and subjects every hour and having something called homeroom if I’ve got my facts in order.

There were also shop classes like wood- and metal-shop and drafting.

I will never forget the time that an intramural softball game was rescheduled for play near the end of the school year. A weather-related event was responsible for the postponement.

Game day had finally arrived and on our team I know for a fact that at least 10 players got to play. For however many innings the game was, I got to play at least half of them — the first half. Can’t say I remember the score at the time I left the game, but by game’s end we had lost by one run.

Different that day/game was that it wasn’t our PE teacher who would oversee game activities, but a substitute. He also served as umpire. One of the opposing team player’s size, even for a junior high student, was considerable. I mean this kid was big. And, in one of the innings when it was his turn to bat, he figuratively crushed the ball at the strike of his bat. Up till that time, it had to be the farthest-hit softball I ever saw, though it went foul of the left-field foul line. Unbelievably, he was awarded a homerun, you know by the substitute seconding as the ump. His rationale was that the ball was hit so far, it deserved to be fair and that’s how it was ruled. The game-ending homer, a walk-off, if you will.

There were at least some team members left with deflated egos, none more so, apparently, than by the student who filled in for me during the second half of the game. It wasn’t one second after he stepped off the field with my loaned mitt in his hand (he did not bring his own), he lashed out, threw the glove squarely at my face and complained that I was the reason we lost.

Sorry dude if that’s how you felt, but, news flash, your anger is squarely misplaced. The substitute is the one you want to see.

This wasn’t the first time a school sub in a phys. ed setting royally screwed up.

It happened earlier that year and could have even been on the day that the original intramural softball game that got canceled was supposed to be played.

Inside one of the gymnasium activity rooms a game of Greek dodge was played which, if you don’t know, is a variation on the game of dodge ball.

That day, instead of the game being played with what is commonly only one ball, the sub allowed seven in all. Huge mistake. In the Greek dodge game, there are two main playing areas where the opposing players try to knock each other out of that area by throwing and hitting them with the ball. However, in this version of Greek dodge the players were allowed to catch the ball if they could and, if they could, they were still safe. Those who got eliminated had to go to the end zone area where, if they got a ball, they, in turn, could still throw it at the opposing team players who were left in the main area of play. The way the play areas were configured was team A end zone, team B main area, team A main area and then team B end zone. So, the areas of play alternated if you’re trying to visualize this in your head. All players on one team who were the first to be eliminated from the main area, well, they were the team to lose the game.

Now compound this with 7 balls the size of soccer balls coming from all directions, laterally speaking. Chaos. Absolute chaos. An accident waiting to happen and it was I who, as it were, took one for the team. I was hit in the head, in fact, when standing in our team’s end-zone area.

Interestingly, no one was supposed to be throwing the ball from any area trying to deliberately get the end-zone-based players out. They’ve already been eliminated from the main playing area.

That ball that struck my head, hit it with such force that it caused the opposite side of my head to strike the adjacent wall. Play kept going until class was over. The next period, English, is where the extent of the head-strike impact, became quite evident.

I slid off of my desk chair and onto the floor. I felt myself fading. I was out cold.

I remember waking up from the practically intolerable scent of smelling salts. I further remember being taken to the nurse’s office or station, and there I waited for my mom and the ambulance that would transport me to a nearby hospital to arrive.

I remember being asked by someone (I presume it was the school nurse) what my name was, what my mom’s and dad’s names were, what my home phone number was, what my grandmother’s name was and things of that nature. I recall being able to correctly answer all, except for a telephone number, either my family’s or my grandparents’.

Then, as I recollect things, the principal entered the room, and proceeded to ask me a question or two, to which I responded by telling such to go you know where. I actually heard myself say that, as I remember those being the words that left my lips, but, as much as I may have tried, that’s not what I was trying to communicate. I’m sure the principal understood this given the circumstances.

Longer story made shorter, I was loaded up into the ambulance late that afternoon and taken to the hospital. I had suffered a traumatic head injury, obviously, the specific diagnosis, a concussion. After a full evaluation, I was released and allowed to be with my family at home that night.

In hindsight, which is 20/20, I would have to ask what were those subs thinking?! They probably weren’t and therein lies the problem. Lucky me, right? Could it get any worse?

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/28/2196199/-I-told-my-jr-high-school-principal-to-go-to-H-I-didn-t-mean-to

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