We got a flyer advertising a new “health club” in the mail today. I hate gym, and I always have, from the time I was the slowest kid in class, the last to be chosen for any kind of team. In grade school, gym was the only class in which I ever received an “unsatisfactory” grade. I couldn’t climb a rope, couldn’t do a chin-up, couldn’t run around the playground three times without stopping (as I was annually requested to do for the Presidential Fitness test (I don’t know what I ever did to the President that led him to torment me so).
In Junior High, the torment was increased to a new level with our introduction to the institution of the Weight Room. The Weight Room was a sort of airless, windowless closet in which a lot of crummy weight equipment, encrusted with decades of teenage sweat and dirt, was stashed. Weight Room, like all the gym classes, was co-ed. I still cannot fathom what advantage a thirteen-year-old tubby, geeky girl with glasses and a boy haircut was supposed to have derived from being made to assume a variety of embarassing positions on weight equipment, to the accompaniment of crappy 80s pop music and a thorough critique of her physique and personal worth, the latter provided by the 13-year-old boys. LPS has a lot to answer for.
All the gyms I have encountered since then–and believe me, these have been as few as possible–have been characterized by these same basic elements: a disgusting smell, a disgusting film over all the equipment, disgusting loud music, and having to arrange myself in disgusting positions while disgusting males look on.
The state no longer has the power to make me go to the gym. Why on earth would I pay $1225 to voluntarily go to one?
What I find bizarre is when people hop in their cars and drive to the gym to exercise rather than just getting outside and walking (or, heaven forbid, playing a sport or something). Our reliance on the automobile keeps us from physical activity that (I think) is much more fun and rewarding. People go to gyms just for the sake of exercise but when I go walking there are many purposes – talking with my husband, looking at scenery, enjoying the sunshine and balmy 30 degree days in Vermont in February, etc. – and I stay in good shape. Activities and sports where we can enjoy the outdoors or the fun of competition are so much entertaining than sweating on a treadmill or a weight machine.
I always hated those ropes in gym class, too – even with the knotted ones, I could only get a third of the way up before fear of heights or tired muscles made me freeze.
But on the plus side, a gym has a swimming pool and weights. Since there really isn’t anything most of us can do around the house to build muscle strength, Val liked that aspect. Of course, now there is different muscle strength about to be built for many of us, in the form of carrying babies. Welcome back, K-L!
No, still no baby. Maybe I should check to see if our buddy Remigius has posted again, since I have nothing better to do except try to guess what homework I am going to assign until the end of May.
KDC: We keep expecting to hear that the baby is here every day…hope the waiting is going okay for you guys.
Kim: Walking is great exercise, and good for the environment. Wish the urban pattern (and weather) around here lent itself more to walking and biking places. My dream is to someday be able to walk or bike to work most days…well, I guess my dream is to someday have a job. Argh, school.