The Football Field Meltdown

My first semester of college was a major transition for me. In addition to happily adjusting to indoor plumbing, I had to adapt socially and academically to my new environment. And although I did not know or care about Phi Beta Kappa when I matriculated to Randolph-Macon College, I would realize its significance later when I narrowly missed graduating with that honor. It was not my nemesis, freshman physics, that kept me from that honor.  It would be another freshman class – one that to this day, as a writer, I wish I could take over again. 

Although my course load was light during my first semester with Pre-calculus, French, English and Physics, my work-study job, my job as a cook at Golden Skillet, but most of all, my freshman physics class, kept me busy.  Having never taken calculus in high school, I took pre-calculus as a way to prepare for the calculus and other higher math courses I would need to take to major in physics.  What I did not know was that the freshman physics class I was required to take was calculus-based, and it would severely test me during my first semester. 

There were two freshman physics courses offered at Randolph-Macon College. One course was a traditional physics class, where one studies the various theories of physics and their impact on the world around you, what I refer to as “practical physics”.  And then there was calculus-based physics.  If you were majoring in physics, you had to take calculus-based physics, what I refer to as “theoretical physics”.  My theoretical physics class started with approximately 25 people, several of whom were pre-med majors.  I knew I was in trouble when half of the class, many of whom had taken calculus in high school, dropped after two weeks, to either take the other physics class, known as “Baby Physics”, or to drop physics altogether.  

Because the physics we were learning in my class was based on calculus theory, I was expected to already know the calculus concepts that we had not even touched on in my pre-calculus class.  So, I had to teach myself calculus while learning the physics being taught in class.  Needless to say, I struggled. 

The shock of it all hit home when I sat down to take my first college test, which happened to be in physics.  When the professor handed back our tests a week later, I had scored a 47.  Because the class was graded on a seven-point scale, anything below a 72 was an F.  So, my “47” put me deep in “F territory”.  Dr. Temple, who taught the class, let the whole class know that he was disappointed in many of us.  However, he did say that several of our classmates had done well on the exam, and as a result, there would be no curve. 

How could the valedictorian of his high school class, who had never gotten an F on anything since elementary school, get an F on his first test in college? That weekend I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown. Maybe I did – kind of. I did walk to the football field and sat down in the middle of the field and cried. I had a good old-fashioned meltdown. I cried because everyone back home would be so disappointed. But I cried mostly because I felt like a complete failure.  

As I sat down on the 50-yard line trying to get a handle on what was going on, I felt sorry for myself.  The burden of everything felt so damn heavy.  Even though I was working two jobs, I was always short on money. And I felt trapped in my relationship with Suzy, a girl I was dating at the time. Although Elizabeth and I had dated while I was in high school, we had never gone steady, and to be honest, I missed her. And to top it off, my cassette deck has just been stolen out of my car. Nothing seemed to be going right in my life, and I felt like I was falling deeper and deeper into a hole with no way out. 

Somehow, I made it through that tortuous night. And taking one day at a time, I made it through the weekend, and the following week. And I would eventually make it through the semester.  Through sheer will, perseverance, and the help of compassionate classmates who tutored me, and a little luck, I scored a 100 on my second physics test.  And I would end up with two A’s and two B’s for the semester. I had made it to the other side.  Getting that hard fought B in physics taught me that almost anything is possible if you set your mind to it. 

Another thing got me through that physics class and that entire semester – running.  After that meltdown on the football field, I realized that I needed to do something to manage my stress and to help me sleep.  So, I took up running and got so into it that I would go for 10-mile runs and sprint at the end. And to this day, I believe those long runs and the endorphins they released saved me.  Running became a part of me and it became a life-long passion.  I ran then to relieve stress, but I run now for the sheer joy of it.

After the fall semester, Randolph-Macon had a one-month term known as January colloquy. During colloquy, students attend class two hours a day for four weeks. It is an opportunity for professors to teach anything they want and allows students to take some classes that are not normally taught during regular semesters. During my four years at R-MC, I took some fascinating classes during colloquy, one of which was a class on nutrition, taught by a biology professor, which became one of the most interesting and useful classes I have ever taken.  And with my first semester safely behind me, I was ready to take a colloquy class that was fun and easy. 

Although not a gifted writer, I did like to read.  So, for that first colloquy, I took “The Detective Novel Genre.” There was a lot of reading – ten books.  However, reading authors like Dashiell Hammett, author of The Thin Man and The Maltese Falcon, and Raymond Chandler, author of The Big Sleep and Double Indemnity, over Christmas break did not seem too onerous.  The plan when we returned from Christmas Break was to spend two days discussing each novel.  How hard could it be?

When I returned to campus and sat down for the first class, I looked around and noticed that I seemed to be the only freshman.  Well, that was ok by me.  However, one week into the class I also figured out that most of the students taking the course were English majors.  I had stumbled into a class that was being taught by the chair of the English department that was full of writers! And because I was one week into the class, it was too late to transfer.  Worst of all, I found out that each student had to write a short detective story, which would account for 50% of your grade.  Creative writing – you have to be kidding! I did not have a creative bone in my body – at least then I didn’t.

And although I loved the novels we read and enjoyed discussing them in class, I received a C+.  It would be the only “C” I would get in college. Four years later, I would find out that the “C+” I received in that class kept me from graduating Phi Beta Kappa. The top eighteen in our class graduated Phi Beta Kappa. I was ranked 19th. One thing that made me feel better was that my friend Bruce Evans, who was a double Chemistry/Spanish major and a lot smarter than me, graduated 20^th.  He went on to medical school and became a very good doctor.

I have to admit that upon graduation, I was a little pissed off because a class that I could have easily avoided kept me from graduating with that honor and kept me from having a fancy title in my bio.  However, graduating without that honor did not change my life.  And who knows, that class may have created a spark, a spark that with more time, ignited another passion, a passion to write – not to write for grades, money, or notoriety, but just for the pure pleasure of it.  Just like running.