One morning in gym class during 8th grade, at the pinnacle of my social ostracism in life, a time when I couldn't make eye contact with a male classmate without him asking me who my best friend was, our gym teacher made everyone in class in succession stand before the class, bend at the waist, touch their head to a wall and attempt to pick up a small chair.

Everyone had to do this, the boys and the girls, those who could perform the task retiring to a different side of the gym than those who couldn't. Soon a pattern developed: the girls were the lifters and the guys weren't, the point being that girls have a lower center of gravity - oh, and Kourlas, too. Cue laughter.

I have thick legs and calves. God bless the gym teacher for utilizing a public forum to reinforce my dad's rebuke while dressing me in ill-fitting church clothes that I had "hips like a girl."

Labels: body, gym, humiliation, middle school, self-loathing