Where The Girls Aren't

Gina Carrano
Mini-project #6

Throughout the years, a lot of my elementary school days have been long forgotten, but I will always remember the day in fourth grade when my gym teacher introduced us to dodgeball. She showed us how to play with a few quick drills, and I was absolutely enthralled when I realized dodgeball was a game that I could win basically by having a good arm and being able to catch a ball rather than having it hit me. Throwing and catching were my sole athletic skills, but I never fared very well with baseball due to not being a very good hitter. I was a very competitive kid, however, and always wanted to win--finally, here was a game I felt I could be the best at.

When my gym teacher got our class into our first game, the other girls hung back and seemed reluctant but I couldn't wait to try it out. As I had suspected I would, I loved playing it and ended up being pretty decent at it, almost always managing to duck the ball when it came my way and firing the ball in with accuracy to hit even the fastest runners in my class. It also probably helped that I was a girl and small for my age, so no one really seemed to figure me for a dodgeball threat, and I was able to use this naiveté to my advantage to execute sneak attacks on unassuming targets on the other side of the court.

We only played dodgeball in gym class for a few more weeks before moving onto another sport; however, like most games played in elementary school gyms, this one eventually moved out to the playground at recess. And like any other sport, as soon as it moved outside the friendly confines of gym class the rules grew more lax and the competitive atmosphere grew thicker.

The playground dodgeball games were all organized by the boys, and none of the girls except me were interested in playing. Especially since the "friendly dodgeball" we were required to play in class could now become a little bit more aggressive, the boys thought it was "their" sport and the girls mostly stayed out of it. I was the only girl who ever asked to play and I got denied multiple times. At the time, I didn't really understand this. I knew that girls and boys weren't athletic equals from watching professional sports on TV and watching the girls soccer team my dad coached. But what boggled me was that when we had played dodgeball in class, I was always the first girl picked. If I played the game well in class, why did they think I wouldn't play just as well at recess? If they wanted me on their team then, why not now?

I asked them as much and they basically told me in so many words that sports were different in class than they were out on the playground with a group of guys. I forget exactly what they said, but it was basically that the games were going to be too aggressive for a girl, in fourth-grade vernacular. I was discouraged and hurt, but I was also kind of shy and didn't press the matter any further at that time.

As far as how I felt about it though, it didn't change my view of sports because I think I already knew that boys and girls weren't athletic equals. This I had gleaned at a young age from watching the difference between a game played by the girls soccer team my dad coached, and a pickup game played by my dad and his friends. I knew that guys took and gave more hard knocks than girls did when they were playing. But I also truly believed that even though I may not be as strong as them, I could hang in with them or even beat them when it came to dodgeball. And being excluded didn't change my level of interest in dodgeball or my desire to play; if anything, it only made me want to play more to prove to them I could do it.

Eventually, I did prove myself somewhat. Whenever we played dodgeball in gym from that point on, I always went out of my way to step up and play as well as I possibly could. Once the boys saw that I could really play and that I wouldn't cry or anything if I got hit hard by a ball, they eventually relented and let me play in their recess games sometimes. Even all these years later, I still enjoy playing dodgeball and talk my friends or my cousins into getting a friendly game together every so often (this has become easier to do since the popularity of the movie Dodgeball with Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn. ) And even all these years later, I still go out of my way to play as hard as possible and try to beat the boys.