It was in sixth grade.  I’m sure of it. Mostly because I was in competition with a girl name Patty S, a tall blonde dream girl who always tried to beat me finishing tests.  She smiled at me even when I beat her, which wasn’t often, but oh my, when such a beauty smiled at me it made it all worthwhile.  But then, she probably never frowned that I could remember.  And she was a fast runner too.  But not as fast as I was. I remember running everywhere, fast and long, whether it was through the neighborhoods playing ditch or capture the flag with my friends, around baseball diamonds, football fields, or away from the elementary school when the neighbors saw us climbing up on the roof of the school to play stick ball, then calling the cops on us poor innocent kids.  Yeah, I was fast.

Then something happened.  Not sure what – maybe I fell and injured myself, I don’t’ remember.

So, my Sixth – grade teacher, Mr. Leroy, who never smiled ever, somehow decided he was an orthopedic surgeon without going to medical school or something, and said something very devastating to me at the age of 11:

“Carson, you have a bone bruise on your heel. I am afraid to tell you this, but you will never be able to run again.”

Now at the age of 11, that was pretty devastating news, I do remember that.  Never run again?  Sounds so final.  Not only will Patty always beat me now, but my life clearly depended on the ability to run, and well this was my sixth – grade teacher, and I was supposed to respect his opinion because he was smart and older an all that. I don’t remember if he examined me or anything, but even if he did, were sixth – grade teachers orthopedic or sports medicine doctors by default?

Of course, like everything else back then, you never told your parents anything because well, you didn’t. So, for a certain time period, Mr. Leroy’s statement that I would never run again, deeply imbedded in my mind and wouldn’t leave and apparently I believed him.  I may have curtailed some of my sports activities and thought about my alleged bone bruise much longer than I should’ve and it became some sort of psychological anvil I now wore on my perfectly fine heel.

I think it forced me to do other things, like well, learn to play the trumpet.  My father played the trumpet when he was in high school, so since he had an old smelly trumpet, he let me have that to make noise on, and I practiced it, thinking it would help me impress Patty somehow, or maybe Joanne, the Polynesian girl, and as time went on, I became fairly decent with it.  However, trumpets are not a good instrument for parties and small gatherings.  Guitars are, of course, but no one told me that, but I did know that only long – haired hippies played guitars.

This bone bruise thing was probably not much of anything at all, but Mr. Leroy, for some reason, decided to make it a big issue for me. Eventually I started ignoring this you will never run again silliness, and started running again in Junior high school and I found out, the natural skill I was blessed with came back and in fact, I joined the Junior High (Middle school) track team, running the half – mile and then mile.  I did this mostly because no one at that age could run a mile, so I didn’t have much competition, at least, in my school.   But one day, I thought my Junior High track career would end quickly because a bunch of track athletes decided when the coach wasn’t looking that they would bury me beneath the large foam bags under the high jump bar then pile on top of me as long as they could to see if I would scream or die or something.  Turns out I did think I was going to die, but some kind soul finally pulled off the foam bags and the bodies on top of me just in time. 

And some time later, I broke the all – time school record in the mile run and went on to have a good running career in high school and college.

Mr. Leroy, if you are still alive and for some stupid reason you are reading this material, you were a worthless piece of crap for saying that to me back then.

After sixth grade though, Patty and I went to different schools and I never saw her again, but Patty, you were my first love and my inspiration, and although we never spoke about it, I am sure you knew it.

© SRCarson 2021