YOWWW!!!

Did any of y'all play field goal in school back in the day? It was a simple game--one player held up two fingers as goal posts and the other flicked a folded paper triangle between them to score. It was a favorite in study hall and was, of course, strictly forbidden as an illicit form of socializing. It was a sure trip out into the hall for a swat with the paddle--and that made it irresistible for dare-devil Jr High boys..

That was particularly true of the big eighth-period study hall in the cafeteria. A divider separated the boys from the girls, and the lack of something to look at--along with it being the next to last period of the school day--made for a bunch of restless adolescent boys.

The study hall was run by Mr Dolan,  the Boys' Health teacher. He was a bandy-legged little red-head known for his lengthy and detailed accounts of his recent prostate-massage treatments--the harrowing tale was, I imagine, intended to scare us off from thoughts of sodomy--and for his bragging about his tennis backhand.  He was a jovial fellow but a strict disciplinarian; his famous threat was that if he caught you talking in his class and he could hear what you said, it would be one swat for every word he heard...I don't think he ever carried it out--but we believed implicitly that he  would!

He was also one of the only teachers who would paddle ninth-graders--most places we would already be up at the high school, and  we lorded it over the seventh and eighth-graders who could barely glance sideways without being hauled out into the hall and told to grab their ankles...

Now, Mr Dolan had another peculiarity. About half-way through the study hall he would often stroll out the door and go --reportedly--to flirt with the secretary in the office.  Of course we all knew he would have secretly recruited some kid to take down names of anyone who tried to take advantage of his absence--but you might as well wave a red cape at a bull as dare an adolescent boy to take a chance...

Now, on the day in question--which by chance was  exactly 43 years ago this week--I had failed to get a library pass and was sitting there quietly pretending to study while avidly fantasising about a friend of mine named Kurt Kramer.  He was a pretty boy, cherub-faced, good-natured with an infectious glint of mischief in his eyes.  And most importantly, he had--at least to my discerning eye--the sweetest little ass in the world.

I had been enamoured with Kurt since the first day of seventh grade, and many were the nights I jacked myself to sleep visualizing pulling his bare bottom across my knees and reddening it while he squirmed and begged...

As I recall, that is exactly what was going through my overheated brain when Mr Dolan came back into the study hall,  discretely picked up the up the judas list from little Lance Polansky, and made his announcement.

Now the procedure was that he would call out each name and the unlucky boy would slouch out into the hallway--many days there would be a dozen or so--and Mr Dolan would follow with the paddle, call out the industrial arts teacher from across the hall to act as witness,  and one by one the boys would step up. bend over, grab their ankles and hang on for dear life.

Like I said, Mr D was awfully proud of his tennis backhand. So instead of facing the boy's bent-over backside, he faced away, swung like Arthur Ashe and placed a faultless lob right across the tight-stretched seat of  the kid's pants. WHAM! The sound would resonate around the silent cafeteria, and we would hold our breathe to see the freshly chastised rascal come slouching back in, trying to look unimpressed and not wince as he took his seat... Then WHAM, and the next boy would make the walk of shame.

It was a pretty good show--as long as you weren't on the list. And as it was pretty predictable--at least two or three times a week--I had taken, on days when I was in the  library, to asking for the wooden bathroom pass at just the right time and lingering at the end of the cafeteria hallway to watch along with the hall monitors and the girls who volunteered in the office. Mr D didn't mind--I think he enjoyed the audience, probably figured it had a deterrent effect...

I was facing Kurt  a couple of tables away when Mr D started calling out names.  I'd seen him playing field goal with the boy across the table from him--hadn't thought anything of it,  his boyish grin and sweet nature generally slid him out of jams, and he was one of the few of us ninth-graders who had gone  all three years without a swat--so when the first name on the list was called and the boy he'd been playing with shrugged and got up to go out in the hall, well, I caught my breath. and

KURT KRAMER!

The look on his face was priceless! Absolute shock. As the names kept being called he got up and made the long walk across the cafeteria and out the door, and all I could think of was the library pass I hadn't been able to snag that morning, and how if I had then I'd be there at the end of the hall, bathroom pass in hand, eyes locked on Kurt bending over, waiting for the

WHAM!!! YOWWW!

A wave of giggles swept across the room. Nobody made a sound when the wood slammed across their butt, not the wimpiest kid, not Todd Trotter when he took a step away from the impact and had to bend back over for two more, not even Rusty Hampton when he made fun of old Mr Belker's glass eye and got six killer swats and would have got more if the teacher witnessing hadn't made it stop (Belker got a "vacation"
for the rest of the school year "for health reasons" and Rusty was a minor celebrity around the locker room showing off his  black-and-blue buttocks).

Every eye in the room  was locked on the doorway, I was literally holding my breath to see who the poor kid would turn out to be. The teasing he would get, the giggles of girls in the homerooms  when their posturing boyfriends told them the story, the never-to be forgotten disgrace people would remember at high school reunions well into the twenty-first century...let him be cute lethimbecutelethimbecute was the mantra echoing through my brain...

And yes! There he was, coming through the door--it was Kurt! Face crimson, eyes down, making his way across the room, back to his seat. Oh, the humanity! I was squirming, dick hard in my pants, straining to catch every detail--and yes! The slightest hesitation when he lowered his burning behind onto the hard plastic chair...

The swats continued out in the hall. The next boy through the door was the kid Kurt had been playing with--Kurt didn't even look up when he sat down  across from him--honestly, the kid looked more embarrassed for Kurt than concerned with his own throbbing rear.  But then he looked like one of the industrial arts kids, and they got swats all the time...

Well, the beatings concluded and the bell rang, and I followed Kurt down the hall to our ninth-period science class. Of course I had to go over and commiserate with him--he had regained his composure a bit and managed a wry grin when he told how he underestimated Mr D's backhand, and how it was burning worse now than when he got it...That made the girl in the next seat giggle and ended the conversation, and it was time for class to stat anyway...

So many years ago...Kurt, I understand, went on to teach in a college out west, and it is possible that he doesn't even remember the day his backside intersected with Mr D's backhand. Or perhaps it is a funny story he tells his students, who in these degraded times probably never felt a paddle's shock and burn, or even heard the unforgettable sound of one slamming across the helpless ass of a boy they lusted for.

But I remember. Oh yeah, I really do.

Thanks for the memories, kiddo.