On the sidelines

Last night, during the women’s Olympic synchronized diving competition, before the women’s gymnastics team finals, I wondered if I could remember my old beam routine. I got up off the couch and padded over to the kitchen, where two of the hardwood beams approximated the 4-inch width. When I was a kid, I’d walk through my routine out of habit, using the same hardwood gauge on my parents’ floors. They have a longer hallway that fit my purposes more easily than our boxy kitchen.

My feet automatically assumed the catlike posture, toes outward, heels inside. I simulated my handstand press mount and stepped through the light footwork before my major tumbling pass, which was a back handspring to a layout-step-out, at my peak. I walked briskly backward, still on the two floorboards, not taking the chance of tumbling on a hard floor, and continued on. Switch-split leap, fish jump. Full turn. Cartwheel to straddle planche. Pivot turn, feel for the back of the beam, run and spring for front pike dismount.

The beam was not my favorite event. I preferred giant swings on the bars or dancing my way through the floor exercise. I was too twitchy on the apparatus, but it was a necessary evil for all-around success. When I was eleven, I had the best beam routine of my life. All of my tumbling was rock-solid, I could focus on the end of the beam without any visual interruption, and I was in the middle of the line-up. I ended up winning the state competition for my age group that day.

About a year later, at another meet, during my last chance to practice on the competition equipment (the thirty-second “touch” warm-up), I fell down the side of the beam during my layout and burnished an angry scrape on my thigh. My coach agreed with me to tone down my tumbling, and I managed to get through the routine without a fall, despite the deafening silence that accompanies the last girl to compete in the rotation. After I landed my dismount and saluted the judges, I lay down behind the team bench and iced my leg before the next event. When I returned to the gym the next week, I had to knock out my jitters and relearn the layout. It was very difficult, and I never fully succeeded before I quit during that summer before eighth grade.

While we watched the gymnastics Olympic trials a few months ago, JG asked me if I missed it. No, I replied. I don’t miss the intense workouts or the hovering pressure I placed on myself to be perfect. I don’t miss wondering if my friends were having fun on Halloween without me or regretting that I could never go ice-skating because of the risk of injury. But I do miss working for something that was so much higher than myself. The chances of me making the Sydney team were slim at best, but that was the goal. So, yes. I miss that.

I watched the team finals with sweaty palms from bed last night, doing crossword puzzles during commercial breaks to keep me awake and trying not to bother JG by shrieking at every balance check or arched handstand. The outcome was disappointing, but there is still a lot of competition left, so it’s time to move on. The gymnasts today are completely different from the girls with whom I competed, and their skills are beyond what I could have imagined when I was in the sport. Despite that, I can understand a shadow of what the team has undergone to come to this point, so I will always have that bond with these athletes. And for whatever it’s worth, I still know my beam routine.

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