Stoner and the Exhausted American

(ARTWORK BY "SPUNK" -- CYNTHIA B. HASSALL )


Reuters) - Exhausted American John Isner, whose epic first-round match broke all tennis records at 11 hours and five minutes, was beaten in just 74 minutes by Dutchman Thiemo De Bakker at Wimbledon on Friday.

When the epic-length Wimbledon match was first reported, I found myself thinking of an incident from my days at Central Middle School -- probably for the first time since it happened.


As my more-fortunate peers no doubt remember, the student body at Central was composed almost entirely of delinquent sociopaths from Lowertown (“Old Village”).

In an effort to distract from the non-school activities readily available to them (a quick jaunt home to drink dad’s beer; a hop on the freight train passing by the edge of the football field; a shop-window-smashing run through downtown), the school always tried to offer diversions during the lunch hours: screening movies, or forcing the school’s brass band to play concerts, in the cafeteria ; keeping the gymnasium (and, often, the natatorium) open for intramural competitions and/or free play.

Judging by the level of on-site violence, I’d say the school did the surrounding community a great favor in this.

Anyhow…One week during my six-grade year, the PE department ran out of serviceable ideas, and decided to hold an arm-wrestling tournament.

I signed up, and drew a Tuesday slot. As a spectator on Monday, and as a twelve year-old with a movie-fed imagination, I felt the event lacked…tension, suspense. The real problem, it seemed to me, was that each bout lasted only a minute, hardly enough time for even my bloodthirsty classmates to work up a real bloodlust.

I was pondering thus when my opponent for the next day, a friend of mine -- he wasn’t in my class, but we had an elective together that year (“Poster Art!”), and had previously endured a Sunday School class taught by a very angry layman -- sought me out in the bleachers: “Hey, we’re wrasslin’ tomorrow!”

He sat down and we watched the day’s matches together, and when I pointed out that the bouts all ended too quickly, he agreed with me. And then I had my big idea.

This friend -- his name was Scott, actually -- was a Lowertown delinquent, but not yet a sociopath. At this point, he was a running buddy of sociopaths, but he hadn’t turned yet; that point would come in a year or two. (In 1979, he flipped me the bird while we were both standing on the altar, with a priest, during catechism prep!) In sixth grade, he was still a sweet-natured guy.

What I said to him was: “Hey, let’s make our match last, like, ten minutes!”

“I don’t know,” he said. “What if you beat me? I don’t want to lose.”

“Come on,” I said, “you’re gonna win. Let’s just drag it out. It’ll be cool. Everybody’ll go nuts.”

We sat there, each imagining, I have no doubt, the girls of the sixth grade “going nuts”.

“Make it look good,” Scott said.

“You make it look good.”

***

But…of course, even after further prep talk, when it came down to cases, Scott pinned me in forty-five seconds.

He fled the gym. Pissed, I tracked him down in the hallway: “Hey! What happened? WE HAD A DEAL.”

He looked genuinely contrite. It was the only last time I saw him look that way.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I got bored.”

***