untitled by Tara Spalty
I’ve been to many a church in my time, but there is none more spiritual than the church on the corner of N.Lamar and Houston Street here in Austin. Outsiders would not consider the tin metal shack hiding in the corner of a warehouse strip mall a church by any means, but it is in that rustic metal box which houses a boxing gym is where I found sanctuary from life’s ups and downs.
The gym itself appears small from the outside as it was once a car garage, but the inside is larger than life. The front door is a pull up garage door that screams when the sliding wheels roll through the rusted brackets almost daring you to come inside. Once the courage is mustered to come inside, the smell of musty air soaked in the sweat of those who have come before you greet you like an uppercut to the jaw. The first time I walked into the gym, I almost puked because the air was so foul like dirty laundry never washed. Three months later, the air had the scent of roses.
Heavy bags hang from the ceiling like Christmas decorations. Black, Blue and Red bags that beg for someone with enough heart to try and wear them down with punches. The bags sort of come to life and laugh when you’ve thrown your last punch. Boxing posters of past glory pose as wall paper, and the images of Ali, Tyson and Leonard cast eyes upon the men and women looking to be something more in life. Cracked mirrors on back end of the gym reflect what the heart wants instead of reality when the boxers shadow box in front of those mirrors. The floor is a jigsaw puzzle of exercise mats and concrete that may have been more appealing some forty years ago when the warehouse was first erected.
In the center of the gym is a boxing ring that sifts through the dirt of your soul to find the diamond inside each one of us who makes our home inside that gym. The ring itself is eight by 10 feet, and sits atop a wooden platform like a stage surrounded by black rope. The canvas is red like the carpets in Hollywood for the unknown stars with the courage to put themselves to the test in front of the other combatants.
Climate control is left for the health spas down the street, so the only heat during the winter is the individual fire that burns inside the men and women who box. Summer heat is quelled with the satisfaction that you have given everything you had when the last bell has rung. There are no windows other than the garage door which never comes down.
Why would I liken a boxing gym to a church? Because the gym is special to me as it is where I once found peace from a world full of anger and self-hatred, but that story is for another day.
Although it was an infrequent occurrence, finding a longer-form narrative (fiction, non-fiction or something in-between) on a Craigslist forum was always exciting. Like this piece that was posted to the South Bend Missed Connections. The story references Austin, which could be the small town in Indiana about three hours from South Bend or it could be many of the other Austins that dot the landscape of the U.S. We’ll never know for sure.
