Incident at the Gym

Thank you all for your kind words about my April Fool misadventure. Unfortunately there seems to be no end of my embarrassing moments to share with you. Here is another one from my School Days. I hope you enjoy it!

Another embarrassing moment in the life of Nana Crunch.

To set the scene we have to go back to the so-called good old days of the 1950’s when I attended High School in Edinburgh, Scotland. Back then you generally left school at age15 unless you passed your “Highers” and could go on until you were 18. We sat exams in elementary school grade 8 and these determined what ‘stream’ you would enter in High School. I fell into the category of “Commercial One” which meant I was going to be a short-hand typist whether I wanted to or not. Lower scores were sent to “Domestic” or “Commercial Two”, higher scores got “Languages” and thought they were way better than the rest of us plebs.

“Domestic” meant you were destined for the factory floor, or the service industry and “Commercial 2” meant you were taught some typing skills as well as cooking. The elevated “Languages” classes were taught Latin and German and didn’t have to work with their hands at all. As well as typing, short-hand and book-keeping, we also had English, History, Geography, French, Science, Math, Art, Music and Sewing. They didn’t seem to think we needed to know how to boil an egg but we had to be able to sew buttons on our husbands’ shirts! I also have the painful memory of being given the ‘belt’ by granny Ross, our vicious little sewing teacher, all because I didn’t put my lap-bag on fast enough, too busy talking. This was delivered in front of the class and the fact that I was a hulking 5’ 6” and she stood about four feet nothing did not deter her. I can still feel it! There were several boys in our class but instead of sewing, they were given the manly task of banging nails into bits of wood while we treadled our lives away. I’m sure there must be a place somewhere in another plane of existence where all those mismatched “what-knots” and lop-sided display shelves languish along with aprons, dirndl skirts and unwearable blouses.

That reminds me, we were also taught something called “R.I.”, Religious Instruction, from which the two Catholics in our class were always mysteriously excused, the rest of us being good Scottish Protestants of course. I rather enjoyed this class, it was more like an ancient history lesson and we got to draw interesting maps of the Holy Land. I remember I actually won a prize for an essay we had to write. It was to be a modern day parable and I chose “The Prodigal Son”. Something about him returning home on the Number One bus apparently struck a chord with the jury! The prize I picked was a book, “Animal Tales” by Blackwood, I still have it (my one and only school honour!)

The other class I was not very keen on was Gym. You have to picture the era, we didn’t wear shorts back then we just took off our skirts and ran around in our school blouses and navy knickers. These were made of thick durable navy cotton with elastic around the legs; some even had a pocket in them for a hanky. The classes were not co-ed though, thank goodness.
We would be made to do all the usual humiliating routines of trying to climb the ropes, balance on beams, hang upside down on the wall bars and on occasion, vault over a “horse” or “buck”.

Sadly, I was never very athletic but the Gym teacher, Miss N. always tried to inspire us to greater things. She was convinced this day that I could make it over the vaulting horse. She said we had to take a really good run at it, rebound off the launching ramp, slap our hands in the middle of the ‘horse’ and over we would fly. She assured us she would be there to catch us. So there we were, all lined up around the gym waiting our turn. My heart was pounding but I was determined to give it my best shot. I watched in some trepidation as the girl in front of me hurtled towards the ‘horse’ only to shy away at the last moment, almost taking Miss N. with her. I swallowed hard and gathering my courage prepared for take off. Miss N. was smiling encouragingly at me from beside the beast. “Come on M, I know you can do it!” she called. Taking a deep breath and running as hard as I could, I landed my feet squarely on the ramp with a satisfying thump, launched myself into the air, hands landing precisely as instructed in the centre of the ‘horse’ and then horror of horrors, the elastic in one leg of my “breeks” caught on a protrusion sticking up from the top of the ‘horse’. There was a loud ripping sound and I sailed on leaving most of my knickers hanging on the ‘horse’.

There was a moment of complete silence then the whole room erupted. I can still see all the girls collapsing in hysterics against the wall bars, my best friend M absolutely doubled up with laughter. Miss N after she regained her composure grabbed me to herself and enfolding me in her thankfully wide skirts, marched me lock step to her office. The offending item of clothing was retrieved and I sat and sewed them together in quiet misery as best I could, the laughter of my class mates still ringing in my ears. Miss N, bless her, told me she hadn’t had such a good laugh in years and hoped I didn’t mind but she had just had to tell the next class about my misadventure. Of course it was all over the school by lunch time but I saw the funny side of it and whenever I get together with my Scottish friends we still talk and laugh about it. I’m glad this was well before the days of camera cell phones and You Tube, Britany Spears had nothing on me!