The specific thing that happened when I walked into the cafeteria, the scanning of the room, the calculation of which table was the least hostile, the walking toward it with the specific gait of someone trying to look casual while every nerve ending is alert.
The gym class.
The gym class was its own category.
I will not spend much time on the gym class.
I will only say that forced participation in physical activity in front of people who have decided you are a target is not what the curriculum intended but it was what it produced.
There was one person.
There is always one person, in these stories, and it is tempting to be cynical about this person,
to say that one person is not enough, that one person cannot change the weight of an entire institution.
And you would be right about that.
One person cannot change the weight of an institution.
