It’s that time of the year again, when people carry out their New Year’s resolutions to exercise and get healthy in the New Year. This is time of year when people shell out money for costly gym memberships, dreaming about having abs of steel or buns of iron or maybe just less of a gut. This is the season for brushing the cheeto dust off your chest, reaching for the telephone and finally ordering that piece of exercise equipment sold on late-night TV. When I called, the operator sounded confused when I asked if they could ship my bowflex machine directly to the yard sale in which it will inevitably end up.
I have always been intimidated by gyms. I remember the first time I tried to do some weight lifting in college in a gym. Feeling insecure about my arms, often compared favorably to wire coat hangers, I went right for the bicep curl bar. With no guidance from a friend or a trained professional, the first time I strode in the gym, I did a couple thousand bicep curls. It is amazing how difficult it is to look cool and buff when you can’t unbend your arms for a week. Leaving the gym one day, I ran into a friend on the baseball team, surprised to see that I was in the gym:
“What are you doing here, man?” he asked.
“Oh, I’m just getting in shape, I guess,” I replied sheepishly.
Pausing, he replied, “For What?”
Perhaps that was a good question. I was never athletic or vain enough to become an avid weight lifter. I guess I was on a quest to lose the coat hanger arms or something. But somehow, I never felt comfortable in a gym. The first commercial gym I joined was in New Jersey and I was constantly ill at ease. There were a lot of men with tight perms and tiger print weight lifting pants walking around. Taking my initial required orientation with a personal trainer, my physique seemed to be a curiosity to this muscle bound, sort of square looking guy. Adjusting the Nautilus equipment for a “chest fly,” he said, “I’ve just rarely seen anyone as, uh, flexible as you.” Not burdened by muscle on my shoulders, back or arms, I could almost touch my shoulder blades together.
Foregoing a life as a circus freak, I mostly stayed away from the scary free weights and always tried to get some aerobic exercise in. Keeping a low profile on the treadmill is a breeze for most people. A simple distraction, however, such as an attempt to change the radio station on my walkman or the presence of a pretty girl, would inevitably lead to my foot striking the outside of the treadmill sending me into a George Jetson pratfall. I never really understood the art of meeting members of the opposite sex in the gym. Many of us are not looking our best in mid-workout, and no one really wants to hear “aren’t you the guy who just fell off the treadmill?”
After six weeks of holiday overeating, I finally made it back to the gym last night. I saw a guy in the mirror who’s pushing 40 hard and looked like he needs some exercise. I also saw a guy who was slightly embarrassed because he was looking at himself in the mirror as he used the stairclimber. How lame is that? These days the elliptical machine has passed the stairclimber as the stationary machine of choice among young women. I remember when the stairclimber ruled, leading a lecturer I once heard to say, in a perfect North Carolina drawl, “Why a woman would want a butt like a 12 year old boy, I will never know.”
My attempts to maintain a modicum of dignity in the gym continue, but it is an ongoing struggle. Perhaps I should follow the best advice I ever heard about what the perfect exercise equipment is: try a good pair of sneakers and a couple of barbells. [Originally posted 1/10/2008]
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