When we were quite young my parents decided to enroll my sister, brother and myself in a fitness program. Long before the advent of the modern fitness club there were special athletic programs and Milwaukee Turners was one of them. In the year or two we attended I learned to climb a rope, do a somersault, a headstand and a handstand, and an exercise on the rings known as a bird’s nest. The only reason I reference this experience is it served as a precursor for my decision to participate in the gymnastics program at Samuel Morse Junior High. We spent an entire semester getting ready for a single tournament that involved a limited number of junior high schools. Mr. Hrlavich was a young physical education teacher with a lot of energy and an earnest desire to help adolescent boys achieve athletic success. He took each kid where he was and encouraged him to develop whatever skill he was working on to the maximum of his ability. More importantly he did not tolerate anyone making a discouraging comment or belittling in any way the efforts of any students. Boys who had always dreaded the idea of attempting any physical activity due to thinness, fatness, lack of coordination, weakness, slowness, or whatever, actually looked forward to participating in Coach Hrlavich’s gym class. This is not to say that he converted awkward gangly kids into outstanding athletes, or that he didn’t have a group of athletically gifted students he favored, just that he recognized the importance of instilling in all his students a desire for physical fitness. In no way should one get the impression I was one of the elite athletes for nothing could be further from the truth. As far as I can remember everyone competed in all events, and no one specialized in any particular event. In other words, even though Wally was stronger than most high school athletes and could perform an iron cross on the rings, he would not be the one to represent the school in the rings exclusively. Everyone had to do the rings, and Wally would have to do the horse, parallel bars, horizontal bars, and tumbling just like the rest of us. There were certain athletes, like Roger, who had the strength, grace, and coordination to make any exercise look simple. Beyond that, Roger was the kind of kid who understood two concepts that made him seem less adolescent and more mature. Roger was kind and humble. He showed me how to apply the right amount of chalk to my hands to soften the friction, and helped me arch my back to gain proper form on the horizontal bar. In the locker room, when one of the kids said we would win the tournament because we had Roger, Roger said he was pleased the kid had confidence in his ability, but knew there would be other great athletes coming from the other schools. He was right. I don’t remember how we did, how Roger did, or how I did, but I do remember being a part of a team that got to go to Coach Hrlavich’s house in the suburbs one evening after school. His wife and little kids were in the backyard with us, and before he passed out awards for participation in the tournament and thanked us for all our hard work at practice, he grilled burgers and shared stories of his days as a minor league catcher. Comments welcome.
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