In 1971, the 26th amendment was ratified that lowered the voting age from 21 to 18. This was all due to the fact that young 18-year-old boys were being drafted into the Vietnam War when they couldn't even take part in politics. Therefore, there was a slogan that read "old enough to fight, old enough to vote."
So based on similar yet skewed logic, as an 11-year-old, I was not able to vote for who our next president was. But this president was allowed to tell me that I have to run the mile in 9 minutes? That just doesn't seem fair. Old enough to run the pacer, old enough to vote.
I am, of course, referring to the bogus 'Presidential Fitness Test.' of old. As a run-down, Dr. Hans Kraus and Bonnie Prudden were not the dramatic leads of an Austrian soap opera. Instead, they were fitness junkies that went on to work with Sonja Weber (Kraus' long-lost evil cousin from the third season) (this is a lieee) to create the Kraus-Weber test. It was a test that helped gauge fitness through various exercises and skills. In the 1950s, Kraus and Prudden administered the tests to 4,000 American children and 3,000 European children. 58% of US kids failed while only 8% of European kids failed. After the Subway 'Eat Fresh' slogan failed to solve the problem (another lie), President Eisenhower created the President's Council on Youth Fitness in 1956 in order to finally bring down those pesky Europeans!
While the Kraus-Weber test was based on strengthening the core, arm strength, and improving flexibility, the Presidential Fitness Challenge was less about fitness and more about random athletic skills in pull-ups, sit-ups, the shuttle run, mile runs, etc. It was Lyndon Johnson (who also called his dick 'jumbo,' said he 'had to mount Congress like he mounts a woman', and would insist on swimming naked and insisted the men with him do the same, but was for some reason given presidential power) who added the elitist Physical Fitness Award for the fittest of kids. The test was put in place until 2013 when it was replaced with a more individualized fitness program that was less humiliating for us less athletically-inclined.
For many of us, the test truly was embarrassing. We all knew who would finish last, who wouldn't pass, etc. Look, some of us are just not meant to run miles or do push-ups! For me, I've always had some heart and breathing problems, so things like the pacer were just pure torture. I also have a chronic pain condition called tenosynovitis, which went undiagnosed for years. Basically, whenever I overuse any part of my body, it becomes easily inflamed, resulting in pain, cracking, etc. I'm my own beat boxer! It's great! I also recently found out that I've been wearing shoes 2-3 sizes too small this whole freaking time, which I definitely feel like is a factor. ("What if you were actually a natural-born runner this whole time and we had no idea?" was a literal question my mother asked me over dinner the other day.) What was really embarrassing was that everyone would see that I was first out in the pacer or last to finish the mile. Unlike academic education where teachers would hand back tests upside down so that other students couldn't tell if you sucked, there was no way to hide that you were bad at P.E. For me, I fell through the crack of a one-size-fits-all physical education system, leaving P.E. classes with a sweat-stained gym uniform and tears. It was truly one of the worst parts of my entire school experience.
The only part of the Presidential Fitness Challenge that I was any good at was sit-ups, where I typically was the last one or close to the last one going along with the horrid recorded beeping track, which is the track I bring to frat parties. The reason for this was that I had a great core (but not abs. Don't go too crazy) from after-school dance classes. (The reason for bringing the recorded beeping sit-up track is that I don't go to frat parties.)
One of my best friends at dance was home-schooled and her parents counted her dance classes as her P.E. I was so jealous. I only wished that my P.E. classes would be in something that I was actually good at, instead of hanging from a metal bar. For me, although dance occasionally hurt, it was the artistic element of it that was a distraction from the pain. There is nothing artistic about the Pacer; believe me. It's a "multistage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues" and it's also an ASSHOLE. There isn't even any purpose! I hope I would run fast if the situation called for it, but there's no reason to run back and forth in the gym. It was USELESS and STUPID and made me LATE FOR MY BUS since I always had gym for last period.
There was this one time, though, where I worked SO HARD to pass the Presidential Fitness Challenge - or at least win the National Award, which is the less hardcore route. For years, I had watched my classmates get on stage at an end-of-the-year assembly and accept their Presidential awards while I sat in the audience and clapped them on because I'm not a sore loser. In 6th grade, I decided that enough was enough. I pushed myself through the pacer; I made my hands hold my weight during push-ups, and I even stayed after school to run the mile down to a perfect 11 minutes.
At the end-of-the-year assembly, I sat with my fellow students, tired but excited to win my very first National Physical Fitness Award that I had worked so hard for. Names were called. We got to the 'S's. Nothing. I thought 'huh, maybe they're doing it by last letter in last names?' We got to the 'Z's. Nothing. I had been FORGOTTEN. I had to watch my classmates get up, hold their stupid printed certificates while I sat in the audience. I didn't clap this time because I wasn't a sore loser - I was a sore WINNER who was DISGRACED and WE ALL KNEW IT.
After the assembly, I approached my P.E. teacher and gracefully pointed out her mistake. She checked her charts and, sure enough, I was supposed to win the National Physical Fitness Award. She apologized profusely and promised to get it to me by 6th grade graduation.
Graduation came and went. Nothing. I left empty-handed and betrayed.
In middle school gym, I refused to take it seriously. What more could they do to me? I pretty much walked the miles, I brought in much-needed doctor's notes to get out of push-ups, and I tried to arrange a sit-in protest during the Pacer ('when the first beep goes off, we just sit down.') No one went for it. I just had this moment of clarity when I realized that there were always going to be people left out of this flawed system. I realized that, all this time, I thought that the Pacer was stupid because I didn't feel like there was any point. You weren't running to or from anyone. But Reader, I guess the thing I was running from the whole time was authority.
This got weird. I'm sorry. I hate P.E.
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