Does your school ever make you play dumb games? I mean games that make no sense and somebody always falls down and gets hurt, or gets sent to the office for getting too mad? That is what our school does, in the name of physical education. And when you are not in high school, you have to do it during P.E. too.

Now I don’t mind some of the games, like Country Jake. Country Jake is a special kind of baseball, where you don’t have a full team and the rules are kind of relaxed. That is kind of fun if its a little cool outside.

But dodgeball? Who in their ever loving mind came up with that concept? A bunch of small kids standing in a circle while other kids get to throw a hard rubber ball and knock a kid hard with it? Sometimes they fall, other times they end up with a big red mark on the side of the head from a dodgeball. I think its kind of barbarian myself, but I play anyway.

And tetherball. I sprained my wrist one day, because I play hard when I play with everything I got, and I went to hit that tetherball and ended up hitting the loop where the rope goes on it with the side of my hand. That one hurt, because my wrist bent the wrong way and I almost broke it. I sat around with ice on my hand until the school nurse said I was fine. It hurt all the way home, and kind of aggravated Mamaw but she didn’t clean anybody’s plow over it, that time.

The one I really hate is volleyball. There is always one tall kid who tries to lord it over everybody else, like he is some volleyball champion. Usually he gets his legs tangled up with some other poor kid who is in the way, and ends up tripping over them, and breaking a nose, a finger or ends up slamming the metal pole and knocking himself crazy.

But there is basketball, and I kind of like that game even though I am not any good at it. There are even some of the shorter kids, and that is all they do. They live like they are going to be a basketball pro one day, and they can even slam dunk. Generally though, one kid gets to be too much of a showoff, and ends up running into the brick wall behind the goal, not able to stop. I always laugh at that, and I know I am not supposed to. That’s what you get for being a showboat.

I guess my favorite indoor game is either handball, or racquetball. I don’t like tennis, because it isn’t indoors, but racquetball feels right to me, and I am fast most times. I win some and lose some, but handball is another deal without the racket all together. You get someone the same size and weight as you, you can slam into them without even fouling if you want. Its rough but sometimes you can take out all that energy in the handball court, and nobody cares.

I guess not all school games are dumb. I am not sure why, but I always thought it would be fun to put goalies at the basketball goals. That way when a showboat tries to do a dunk, a goalie could put up a big padded stick and block it. Seems more fair that way.