I went to what was considered the third-toughest jun- ior high school in the area, not counting the private schools but including the school for the musically gifted.

Accordingly, there were always a lot of fistfights among the boys who were insecure in the pecking order. That was something I didn't participate in, because I knew I was a coward. When boys at the very bot- tom of the hierarchy challenged me to a fight, I would affably concede the contest on the spot, giving them a bye so they could move to the next level without delay.

Then one day a couple of tough kids from the Glee Club beat me up precisely because I wouldn't fight, which I considered unacceptably paradoxical and very ungleeful. I complained to my father, hoping maybe he'd go to school, speak to the boys who'd hit me and then punch them out. Instead, he suggested I visit the YMCA and, in his words, get "toughened up."

The YMCA catalog offered several sports that might make me into a fierce fighter, though my father vetoed my first choice, which was fly-fishing.

I didn't want to do boxing, because that involved getting hit, and I didn't want to do karate, because that involved getting kicked. Archery seemed attractive - I could pick off the entire Glee Club from across the street - but the class was full.

I eventually settled on wrestling, which is really nothing more than a lot of hugging. The wrestlers I saw heading into the gym were all amazingly muscular, and I mistakenly assumed that wrestling was the cause rather than the effect of their bulk.

If I had all those muscles bulging from everywhere, no one in junior high would come after me with anything less than a bow and arrow. In preparation for how tough I would soon be, I stood in front of the mirror and made fierce warrior expressions while tightening my tiny, quivering biceps into what I accurately called "my muscle," because it truly was the only one I had.

The YMCA wrestling coach clearly had never seen anything like me, and the whistle fell from his lips as he saw me lining up with the rest of his team like a spindly newborn calf among a herd of heifers. It turned out that there wasn't a weight class low enough for me. One had to be created.

My wrestling partner, on whom I was supposed to practice my moves, outweighed me by 30 pounds. Week after week, while he chatted amiably about television shows, I'd grunt and strain against him as if trying to flip a Buick. Wrestling, my coach explained, is mostly about perfecting certain holds, though most of the holds I perfected wound up with my face mashed into the mat.

The day of our first wrestling meet, my teammates didn't eat or drink, running laps to sweat and spitting as much as possible, trying to lose a few pounds and wind up in a lower weight class. I mimicked their actions so that by the time I went to weigh-in I was so weak and dizzy my coach had to hold me upright on the scales. I'd managed to lose 2 pounds, nearly 4 percent of my body weight.

I won my weight class that day because there was no one else in it. In fact, halfway through the season I was undefeated, helping my team's standings in its division. I even won on the day I faced my first opponent, who canceled at the last minute to attend a meeting of his coin-collector club.

I had a new reply to the seventh-grade boys and girls who would challenge me to a fight in order to advance their standing at junior high: "I won't fight you, but I'll wrestle you. I'm undefeated on my YMCA team." I'd refer them to a huge, hulking ninth-grader we called Forklift, who would loyally affirm my claim.

"I'm not going to wrestle. I want to fight you," my challenger would eventually say.

"Nope. No fighting, only wrestling," I'd respond.

They'd give up, unable to budge me on this issue; in this, too, I wound up being undefeated.