Life was simple when I was a kid. We didn't have internet or social media, but we made our own fun. We played marbles, jump rope, and kick-the-can until the streetlights came on. We thought hula hoops were Olympic equipment.
I was a skinny kid back then with hip bones that could’ve doubled as coat hooks—which turned out to be perfect for keeping a hoop in orbit. My friends and I stood in the driveway, hoops spinning (or trying to) while the dog barked encouragement and Mom yelled not to hit the car. Every time mine made one full rotation, I declared victory like I’d just broken a world record.
Grace wasn’t our strong suit. We were all elbows and attitude, hoops clattering to the ground like cymbals in a middle-school band. But we laughed ourselves silly and picked them up again. Nobody told us it was exercise—we just knew it was summer, and we were unstoppable… for about twelve seconds at a time.
As with anything, practice improved my skills. I spun that thing for hours on end—up, down, knees, shoulders, reverse, repeat. I was convinced I was destined for greatness—specifically, hula hoop greatness. By the end of summer, I was less a child and more a finely tuned hooping machine.
Then came the moment every legend waits for: an ad in the Manchester Union Leader announcing a hula hoop contest in the J.M. Fields parking lot. Now, if you weren’t around in the 1950s, J.M. Fields was where destiny went to buy discount socks—a department-store empire with all the glamour of a fluorescent light bulb. But to me, that Saturday, it might as well have been Madison Square Garden.
I could hardly sleep the night before. My mind was spinning faster than a hoop itself. In my ten-year-old brain, this wasn’t just a parking-lot contest—it was the first step in a dazzling career. I pictured myself crowned as the Grand National Hula Hoop Champion, my name in glittering lights in Times Square: “The Girl Who Defied Gravity!” Maybe there’d be a parade, a key to the city, or even a handshake from the President. Reporters would clamor for interviews, toy companies would beg for endorsements, and I’d humbly say things like, “I just want to thank my hips.” By morning, I was practically famous—at least in my own imagination.
The next morning, armed with my trusty hoop and a level of confidence usually reserved for astronauts, I arrived to find what looked like every child in New England. The parking lot was wall-to-wall kids—rows of bony knees, saddle shoes, and neon plastic rings.
A man with a loudspeaker stood on the back of a flatbed truck, barking orders like we were troops heading into combat. “Hoops up! Hands ready! On my mark!” Mothers waved from the sidelines, dads fiddled with cameras the size of toasters, and the air smelled like asphalt, popcorn, and Coppertone—that unmistakable summer perfume of ambition and second-degree sunburns. I took my place in the front row, gave my hoop one last respectful glance, and waited for the signal.
“Go!”
I stayed focused, channeling the hours of backyard training that had made me the terror of my neighborhood. I wasn’t just spinning plastic—I was defending honor. My strategy was flawlessly executed: I kept away from the chaos. I drifted toward the edge of the crowd, where no rogue elbow or flying hoop could take me down.
One by one, the contenders fell. Some got tired. Some lost rhythm. Some, clearly amateurs, forgot which direction to spin. By the ten-minute mark, the battlefield was alive with the unmistakable clatter of defeat—hoops hitting asphalt with a hollow clack-clack-clack, spinning in sad little circles before wobbling to a stop around the fallen hero’s ankles.
Then came the voice from the heavens—or, more accurately, the tiny loudspeaker bolted to the back of a flatbed truck: “We’re down to ten contestants! Nine! Eight!” it blared, the announcer’s voice cracking with patriotic urgency, as though the fate of democracy itself depended on who could keep a hoop spinning the longest.
Parents gasped. Toddlers wailed. Somewhere in the crowd, a man dropped his snow cone in suspense. The tension was thick enough to bounce a hoop off of.
And then there were two.
Her and me.
The crowd drew in close, the sea of faces blurring into a single collective gasp. The announcer’s voice boomed through the loudspeaker, trembling with importance. “Ladies and gentlemen, it all comes down to this!”
She was about my age, maybe a little taller, with a determined squint that said she’d been training for this moment her whole life. Our eyes locked in battle, two warriors bound by destiny and poor fashion choices. Around us, the parking lot shimmered in the heat—a coliseum of cracked pavement and gum wrappers.
Somewhere in the distance, a car horn honked. Somewhere else, a baby cried—the soundtrack of destiny. The crowd murmured in awe, sensing history was being written between the Garden Center and Automotive Repair.
She began to edge closer, using the oldest trick in the book—the bump. One false move and my hoop would spiral out of orbit. I countered by shifting just beyond reach, my hoop spinning strong, defiant, loyal to the end.
The announcer’s voice dropped to a dramatic whisper. “Two remain... only one will stand!”
That’s when instinct took over. I stepped forward, gave her hoop the gentlest tap, and retreated like a general executing a flawless maneuver. For one glorious second, we were mirror images of chaos and panic—her hoop wobbling wildly, mine threatening mutiny. The crowd gasped, the sun flared, and time itself held its breath.
Then—victory. Her hoop clattered to the pavement in defeat while mine recovered, steady and triumphant, the last survivor in a field of fallen heroes.
The announcer raised his arms in triumph. “We have a winner!” he bellowed, as if announcing the end of World War III. The crowd erupted in polite suburban applause, the kind that says, Well, good for her, but also what time is lunch?
I had done it. I was the undisputed Hula Hoop Champion of J.M. Fields, Manchester, New Hampshire—conqueror of all who dared spin against me.
I don’t even remember what the prize was. Probably a new hula hoop. Maybe a gift certificate worth seventy-five cents. But it didn’t matter. For one shining afternoon, I was somebody. My name wasn’t in lights, but if you squinted hard enough, you could imagine it reflecting off the chrome bumpers in that parking lot.
I went home that day taller—not physically (I was still only ten, after all), but in the way kids get when they’ve stared down destiny and won. My reign as champion didn’t last long; life moves on, and new fads come faster than dandelions in June. But that day taught me something about grit, balance, and knowing when to bump back.
It taught me that sometimes life’s biggest lessons come with the smallest trophies. It was never really about winning a hula hoop contest in a parking lot—it was about learning how to stay steady when things start to wobble. Every so often, I can still feel that hula hoop circling my waist—though I'm not nearly as skinny as I was back then, and I really have to search to find those hip bones. The hoop isn't plastic anymore, but life itself, daring me to stay balanced, focused, and just a little playful. And maybe that’s the real secret—not to keep it spinning perfectly, but to just keep spinning any way I can.
And whenever I see a kid twirling a hoop in a driveway, I can still hear the hum of plastic in the air, smell the asphalt, and feel the pulse of the crowd in that J.M. Fields parking lot—the day the world, for one ten-year-old girl, stood still.
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