Part of Bill's incredibly stupid web diary. Read some more today, yerhear!
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Trunacy for beginners.

(Hmm, a quick glance at the calender is showing a pattern to these diary entries. Perhaps nothing interesting at all happens on days begining with T or S.)

Anyway, one item of news on the way to work today is that the parents of persistent truants (children who are not at school when they should be) are to be fined by the school heads. Bit of an advance from jailing them, but what the heck.

I don't know if my parents would have qualified, but in my youth, I avoided school on many occasion. Not maths, english, science or anything useful, but PE1 and games.

Those who are have seen me (and I'm not hard to spot) will know that I probably could have done with more exercise, having retained my bulk into adult life. But alas, I really didn't get on with the teachers and I didn't like the sports on offer.

My two elder brothers were rather good at Rugby2 and when they heard that I was coming along to the same school, they were (so I've been told) quite excited and I was already on the team before they even met me. When they did actually meet me and managed to observe how incredibly unfit I was, it must have been a disappointment, but they persevered and the whole class did Rugby. (Was it for me or whould we have done it anyway, I don't know.)

Whilst I enjoyed tackling, the rest of the game wasn't much fun for me. Lots of aimless running about getting nowhere. Even after the indignity of the game, I had to put up with indignity of the showers.

If I ever get the opportuniy to destroy any part of my old school, I would choose the showers. A shy self concious flabby teenager being told to go shower with six other boys with no separating walls between us. I quickly worked out that the standard issue shorts were waterproof, so I could take my underwear off and and quickly put the shorts back on before I go shower. I would still be flabby but at least I could retain a slight degree of modesty.

Thngs improved after I had a better familiarity with routine. After about three months, games lessons for me hardly involved any running at all. I didn't need a shower, but the teachers insisted I had one. So I just got my hair wet and laid low for ten minutes. No-one knew any different.

For these tricks, one thing tipped me over into the criminal world of trunacy. I hadn't finished my maths homework. I wouldn't have enough time during "break", but the 90 minutes of games time would be perfect. My first ever criminal act, I went to the school library instead. Oooooooh.

The following week, I turned up to games as usual, expecting trouble. No-one had noticed that I was missing. Wow!

Could I get away with it again? Three weeks later, I didn't need the time for anything useful, but reading some random books sounded more fun than a grudgingly not-playing-Rugby followed by shower humiliation for 90 minutes.

For a year and a half, I would take time off on odd occasions. Some old routine, use the toilets and merge into a passing crowd which would regularly walk past the library.

It couldn't last. One week, busted. Someone noticed I wasn't there that one week. I was kept back after school for an hour the following day. When we started, the games teachers had told us (almost with glee) that PE detentions can be a lot harder than other detentions, as they can make us do exercises. Fortunately, I think the teacher responsible for detentions wanted to get home sharpish and I just waited in an office for 40 minutes.

So, was there a way to get out of games without getting the full sadistic detention? For about a year, I had a big amenesia problem, as I kept forgetting to bring my sports kit in, week after week. No punishments, I just had to sit on at sidelines. That worked until they started the detentions for those who didn't bring thier kit in.

I eventually fell into a the strategy of bloddy-mindedness. I would turn up, get changed, and whatever role I would be assigned, I would usually find myself sitting down leaning against the goal posts. I was on the field and I was taking part, that was all that mattered. If I was in a particularly bad mood, I might try scoring against my own side, but no-one noticed as I was really bad at the game.

Finally, with one year of school-with-games to go, a solution was found. They called it "outdoor pursuits", walking, target shooting, driving, etc. Perfect. All run by the mad metalwork teacher. Couldn't they have offered this earlier?

1 "Gym", for the Americans amoung us.
2 For the Americans again, think football but without the armour.


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© Bill Godfrey, 13th December 2002.