The Breast Stroke: Part I

By James Osborne
Contributing Writer

In Sept. 1988 Hurricane Gilbert was in Jamaica; I was in junior high school, and the Olympics were in Seoul Korea. American swimmer Matt Biondi had been defeated by a swimmer from Suriname the night before. During a discussion of this in my homeroom class I said quite know-it-all-ishly “Biondi isn’t competing in the breast stroke.” Ms. Suarez started snickering “Breast stroke? Hahaha! It’s the breath stroke!” The class erupted in laughter that lasted an eternal half minute. I was humiliated; I hid my face while the room spun.

I couldn’t concentrate all day as that moment kept replaying itself in my head with the phrase “breast stroke” reverberating. The sight of the red faces of classmates in hysterics looking at me, the breast sayer, was all I could think about. Stanley Adams, the kid behind me, poked me in the back of the head with his index finger, the physical manifestation of the word “dumb*ss.” I couldn’t stop going over the lineup of girls I had crushes on in my homeroom class who openly laughed in my face: Rene Putnam, LaTisha Green, Jessica Harver, and how the “breast stroke,” where I was concerned, would remain an Olympic event.

School let out that night and I managed to get the embarrassment out of my head until I turned on the tv after dinner to see an Olympic swimming pool. The sight brought back all the heart-dropping devastation and embarrassment from homeroom that morning. I noticed while watching the breast stroke event that…it was called the breast stroke! I had been ridiculed unjustly. Ms. Suarez is the one who was wrong. I got laughed at because she’s dumb, not me. I showed up early the next day with a copy of the Olympic edition of People Magazine which profiled American athletes, and the breaststroke was mentioned several times. I couldn’t wait to rub it in her face.
                                                                           
Miss Suarez was my homeroom and Social Studies teacher. She was a beautiful 23-year-old Cubana with a large chest and thick, long hair. Since 6th graders were between 11 and 13, I imagine she was the object of quite a few other boy’s maiden masturbation fantasies as well.

When I got to school the next morning, Miss Suarez hadn’t shown up yet. We didn’t have assigned seating in home room, but everyday that year I was sure to get there early to get a seat directly in front of Miss Suarez’s desk. When I got to my desk that day there was a set of books that were not mine sitting on it. I put them on the desk in the next row and was quickly informed of two things. The books belonged to Stanley Adams and Stanley Adams does not like it when you move his books. Stanley grabbed me by my Spuds Mackenzie sweatshirt and said “Put ‘em back mother f*cka!”
Our school was part of a desegregation program that bussed kids from less fortunate (read: black) parts of St. Louis. Stanley was a deseg student and a couple of years older. He was over six feet tall, the size of my father. I had yet to undergo puberty and I still had the size and appearance of a child, but after the embarrassment of the day before, I figured I had to stand my ground. These people had heard me call an Olympic event a woman’s body part; I was determined to keep them from calling me a different one. I sheepishly said in a voice loud enough only for Stanley to hear “No, this is my seat” as I puffed out my chest, maybe to appear bigger than I was.
He yelled again “put ’em back on the desk mother f*cka!” as he knocked my books, Lamborghini Trapper Keeper, and the Olympic edition People Magazine to the floor. I noticed that most of the class, including Miss Suarez, had arrived. I had to redeem myself in front of this audience, which now included my first imaginary lover. I shoved Stanley, who then effortlessly threw me onto his desk.
I looked up and the whole class was looking at me with jaws dropped in disbelief. It was those faces that made me give up on holding back my tears and I bawled without any resistance, stopping only to take deep, stuttering breaths. Miss Suarez grabbed Stanley and I and walked us down to the office. I was paraded through hallways filled with arriving students, sobbing, gasping for air and sucking back snot. 
The guidance counselors at our middle school were in charge of discipline. The one that was assigned to both myself and Stanley was named Miss Bence. Miss Bence was pale, thin, and about thirty with a mushroom bob haircut and a face permanently frozen in indignation. She was a pill by definition and I imagine she had somebody do something terrible to her in her life because every transgression was handled as if the offender had wronged her personally.
The report Ms. Suarez gave Miss Bence simply said I pushed Stanley and he pushed back, which was true in essence. My account was a little bit more dramatic and one-sided. Miss Bence asked Stanley if he threw my books on the floor and he told her he was trying to throw them onto another desk. She replied “were you trying to throw Mr. Osborne into another seat?” She looked at both of us with pained eyes slowly shaking her head, seemingly on the verge of tears and said “What were you two thinking?” Since we both pushed, we both got punished.

We got three days in the Alternative Learning Center (ALC) which was, and still is, euphemistic for in-school suspension. We were made to sit next to each other in a class room full of desks with blinders facing walls. I thought it was a little unfair to give us the same punishment since I had already suffered the humiliation of getting dwarf-tossed onto a desk.

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