If at Birth You Don't Succeed (30 page)

This was what it meant to be the first kid with a disability to be mainstreamed into my public school system. Without my parents' relentless insistence, I would have either been placed in special ed classes or sent to another school altogether. The only reason I wasn't held back in special ed kindergarten for another year was my mother's absolute refusal to accept that as her son's only viable academic path. While her fierce advocacy ensured that I would be among the other kids, inclusion was still something nobody had quite figured out.

In music class, while the rest of the students learned to play the recorder, my complete lack of fine motor skills made it impossible for me to master the intricacies of “Hot Cross Buns.” So I was outfitted with a triangle instead. Luckily, twenty poorly played recorders can easily drown out the sound of one completely a-rhythmic triangle.

My participation in gym class required an asinine amount of accommodations. I had no depth perception because of a botched eye operation, so I didn't know a ball was being thrown to me until it hit me in the face. At the age of nine, I spoke with a voice so high, it'd make Minnie Mouse sound like Barry White. But if puberty had taken its cue from the countless balls I dropped in gym class, I would've been able to convincingly perform “Old Man River” in some racially oblivious production of
Showboat
.

I have never seen more dumbfounded looks than the ones on the faces of my gym teachers during their futile attempts to include me in the high jump. The height at which I could leap out of my wheelchair was a towering zero inches, so while the rest of the children catapulted themselves over the bar, I was allowed to pass under it while throwing my fists up into the air as if I were breaking tape at a marathon.

When my classmates were required to run around the gym for the period, Mr. Marquardt outfitted me with a whistle to blow at the end of every lap. I exploited this power by blowing into the whistle whenever I wanted to. Sometimes I would purse my lips ever so softly, so that half the class would stop and half would stay in motion. This was what taught me the important life lesson that authority without the skill to back it up is just as fun as (and much easier than) earning your place in the world. However, if I was going to learn anything other than how to be a prick, it was clear that I'd need some help.

Believe it or not, even though I enjoyed being a jerk, I
longed
to play sports and compete like everybody else. I just didn't want to make the necessary effort to do so. Halfway through the year it was determined by my fourth-grade teacher and the man with the big whistle that I needed adaptive PE. This meant that one of my gym classes per week would be spent in an individual setting so that the shame of my wussiness could be scoffed at in private. I was told that we would work on things like shooting baskets, throwing footballs, and even walking so my legs wouldn't look like swizzle sticks.

These were activities I wanted to do in theory, but the idea of being separated from the rest of the class and having another adult ride my ass was disheartening. I was already an outcast who was taken out of class for physical therapy and occupational therapy throughout the day and now I needed
gym
therapy? Next they were going to tell me that my contribution to “Hot Cross Buns” was not welcome and that my blobs were not trees! And who decided that whistle blowing was not a sport?

So when an energetic, petite, and perky strawberry blond thirtysomething named Mrs. Fatta came up to me dribbling a basketball with each hand and telling me I was going to learn how to shoot baskets, I was suspicious … yet intrigued. She said, “Show me how you normally would shoot,” and I positioned myself at the three-point line. She raised her eyebrows and said, “You sure you don't want to move a little closer?”

“No, I got it,” I insisted, as I lifted my arms over my head and hurled the ball at the basket. Looking up and listening for the swish, I jumped as the ball came crashing down on my feet. With all of my strength and determination at work, the only thing I'd managed to do with a basketball was injure myself and my pride. Nursing my ego and toes, I took her advice and moved a little closer … and then a little closer still, until I was directly underneath the basket. If she had been physically able to do so, I'm sure she would've lifted me up onto her shoulders and had me place the ball in the net—just to keep up my morale! I knew I was disabled, but I honestly had no idea that I'd be THAT terrible. I'd seen
dogs
play better basketball. (
Air Bud
is the greatest documentary of all time, amirite?)

It was obvious that this, meaning I, was a lost cause. I would've thrown in the towel if I didn't think it would just get caught in my tires. This humiliation was bad enough shared between two people, but what I didn't know was that Mrs. Fatta would be overseeing ALL of my gym classes and making adjustments so that I could “compete” with my peers.

It was always my goal to never be pitied by anyone and Mrs. Fatta made sure of that. Though my athletic prowess was undeniably pitiful, the special rules she created in an attempt to level the playing field between me and my classmates caused me to be despised rather than pitied.

In basketball, instead of a net, I was allowed to score by tossing the ball into a trash can (which is where I thought it belonged anyway). Typically, the rule in baseball is three strikes and you're out, but in my case it was three strikes and … let's give it six more tries. Eventually, Mrs. Fatta would just gently loft the ball onto my bat from three feet away. During football, if the quarterback had mistakenly thrown the ball at me while I was peacefully bird-watching and the pigskin so much as brushed my front wheel, Mrs. Fatta would blow her whistle, rush onto the field, and hand me the ball. She would then proclaim, “It touched his wheelchair, that means he caught it.” “Caught what?” I'd ask, noticing a blue jay. “The ball,” she'd insist, and then the play would continue as if it were in the realm of possibility for me to actually catch a ball.

Unfortunately for the other team, though every accommodation had been made on MY behalf, none was made on theirs. A reception by me meant that in order to be stopped, I would have to be tackled—a task that would require more brute strength than five sixty-pound fourth graders could muster, since I raced past them not on legs but atop two hundred pounds of electrified steel. When I inevitably zipped into the end zone and my flailing opposition derided me with cries of “motorized fag,” I muttered “douche bag” under my breath like a true sportsman, and shrugged off this sham by spiking the ball victoriously. This was a triumph for affirmative action that in no small way changed one fourth-grade class's perception of the disabled from meek and helpless invalids to entitled cheating assholes.

Though Mrs. Fatta and her aggressive support had made it possible for me to be a participant rather than a spectator, her work did little to increase my self-confidence. When she was there, she'd do everything to make sure I could contribute to a team effort, regardless of how embarrassed and emasculated her adaptations made me feel. Hockey was particularly excruciating because I couldn't go five feet without running over the stick. Though I chased after the puck, it wouldn't have done any good even if I'd gotten to it because at no point did my blade ever touch the floor. But without fail, whenever I came anywhere near it, Mrs. Fatta would blow her whistle and make everyone else clear away so that I could either touch the puck for a split second or run over it with my wheelchair.

One day, after a brutally demoralizing match, I couldn't take it anymore. In frustration, I shouted what everybody already knew: “This is ridiculous! I can't play!” I threw the stick on the ground and sat out the rest of the game thinking,
I used to be somebody, I used to have a whistle! That was something I was good at! Whistling, sitting, thinking, and tandem urinating.

Afterward Mrs. Fatta came up to me and said, “What was that? Haven't you heard the expression, it's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game?”

“Well, that's not playing, that's cheating and I still suck! Why should I have to do something I have no chance at being good at?” I sulked.

“Because if you quit, you'll never know if you could be good or not,” she countered.

What does she know,
I thought.
I'm not an athlete. I didn't decide that; God decided that.
In my mind this woman was so stubborn she would've given Stevie Wonder golfing lessons. I thought I should just quit school and become a mattress tester, or one of those living mannequins in storefronts, or a guy who posed for photos in the 1860s—one movement every fifteen minutes sounded just about right to me!

So the next week when we switched from hockey to handball, I was all but optimistic. I'd been so devalued that it had been decided that any team captain who was foolish enough to pick me would get my best friend, Andrew, as well. I was part of a two-for-one special that no smart shopper would touch. When the choices dwindled, I finally made it onto a team, but I dreaded the certain humiliation Mrs. Fatta had cooked up in her palsy playbook.

But as the game began and I prepared to be dishonored and disgraced, something unexpected happened. A ball was thrown to me and I actually caught it. Not caught in the sense that it was thrown in my general direction and touched my chair—I actually caught it. I'd like to think it was because Mrs. Fatta's speech had struck a chord and awoken a competitive spirit in me, but it's more likely because the ball itself was so big and squishy that a cucumber in a coma could have caught it. Whatever it was, from that moment on, that little bit of encouragement propelled me through the whole game to play harder than I'd ever played.

With two minutes 'til lunch, we found ourselves in a tie game and my friend Andrew tossed me the ball.
Oh my God, I caught it
, I thought, dropping it. I heard a familiar piercing whistle and the rustle of windbreaker pants as Mrs. Fatta came to meet me on the court.
Damn it
, I thought.
I should have left after that first catch. Just taken a bow and quit while I was ahead.
But as she handed me the ball, she told me to do something, “Take a shot,” and I noticed that I was directly in front of the goal. I suddenly realized that all those castrating concessions she'd made throughout the year were because she wanted me to meet her halfway and make an effort. So I cocked my arm and launched the ball forward with all the force and fury I could muster.

I didn't see it go in. All I saw was the disgust on the goalie's face as he realized he'd been beaten by quite possibly the worst athlete ever to grace the fourth grade. (I won't name him for fear that, upon reading this and discovering the truth, his wife would leave him and his family would disown him.) My team won the game, but for me it was a much bigger victory; I had won this day because I had chosen to play instead of giving in to my suckiness. And that's what Mrs. Fatta was trying to drive home all along—that the only way to win is to first find any way to put yourself in the game.

Over the next six years, Mrs. Fatta remained my adaptive PE teacher. During our time together, I got to compete in the New York State Games, which are like statewide Special Olympics, where I received eight gold medals (for participation). In honor of the 1996 Summer Olympic Games, Mrs. Fatta had me do a metaphorical trek from Buffalo to Atlanta in my walker over the course of the entire school year, where distance was measured on a peculiar scale of ten miles per lap around the gym. She also took me on several field trips to Holiday Valley for their adaptive downhill skiing program, which I enjoyed so much that I didn't even notice the time my trainer took a spill and I accidentally dragged his tethered body down the slope.

Mrs. Fatta made all of those experiences possible. I appreciated them, but not enough at the time. One day in 2001, after my family had moved districts and I'd dropped out of high school, I got a somber call from Andrew, who told me that he'd learned at school that Mrs. Fatta had been diagnosed with a brain tumor. Her prognosis had been grim and, during an attempt to remove the tumor, she died on the operating table at the age of forty-one.

Her funeral was so beautiful, and the things that were said about her were so lovely, that one of my other teachers absentmindedly referred to it as a wedding. Afterward, there was a reception held at my old high school. I didn't know what to say to her daughter and the only thing I managed to get out to Mrs. Fatta's husband was “I'm so sorry. She always made me feel like I was part of the game.”

She had done that for so many people. She was the only adaptive PE teacher in the whole district, after all, and to this day, her impact is not lost on me. In the years since, I haven't gotten any better at sports, but I have gotten a lot better at trying them. On
Rollin' with Zach
I fell off surfboards, flew off water skis, and got yanked up mountains by my balls while rock climbing. Those physical feats were often painted as more successful and inspirational than I was comfortable with, but when I was coming up with ideas for my YouTube channel I found myself in the altogether unlikely role of personal trainer for a comedy fitness and sports show called
Workout Wednesday
. In that series, I'm still fundamentally the same person I was in fourth grade, at least as far as my athletic abilities are concerned. I'm just outfitted with a better attitude now. So I've been able to encourage myself and my audience to be good sports at the sports we're not good at. I've swum, walked, slid off a treadmill, duct-taped my feet to a stationary bike, and even ridden a mechanical bull.

In highlighting everything that made me feel like I was a failure and an outcast in elementary school, I somehow managed to produce my most successful and widely appreciated work to date. The Gregory Brothers even songified one of my episodes into an insanely catchy dance-anthem called “Lo Lo Lo Lo Lohan.” Seriously, you can check it out on iTunes! With
Workout Wednesday,
I've finally found a vehicle in which I can be funny, positive, and self-deprecating at the same time. I get as many messages from people laughing at my ridiculous one-liners as I do from viewers who are genuinely inspired to start getting in shape. I'm still the worst player, but that doesn't mean I can't be the best cheerleader.