At The Gym, Pride Goeth 'After' A Fall

When I was much younger, I was fairly active in various sports. Although I’m built like a defensive linebacker, I tended to be more interested in track and field, cross country running, weight training and, of all things, volleyball.

I did play some football and even tried my hand at baseball for awhile but my inability to either catch the ball or hit it apparently was fairly important to the coach. Football was easier. All I had to do was focus on falling on top of whoever had the ball and I can fall on anyone fairly easily if I can catch them.

After I left the hallowed halls of academia and got focused on my career, I had less time for athletics. I still did some running and for a few years also played squash three days a week. I liked squash but gave it up after my brother-in-law kicked my ass all over the court without ever leaving the T-line. It’s embarrassing to have a skinny little guy barely work up a sweat while you’re bouncing off walls trying to keep up.

By the time I had hit my forties, the results of too many meetings and too much sitting behind a desk without much physical activity to counteract the effects were starting to show. I figured it was time to do something about it so I decided to join a fitness club.

In the old days, you joined a gym where guys worked out, had a shower and went home. We didn’t stand around naked in the locker room chatting and you never looked at another guy's equipment. Gyms were basically stinky places with gruff people and lots of weights around. There were very few of the fancy things you see advertised on the shopping network these days. I couldn’t find a gym so I joined a fitness club.

Fitness clubs are to gyms what hair salons are to barbershops; a lot of fancy enhancements to basically achieve the same thing. Inevitably, the fancier something is, the more expensive it is.

Fitness clubs aren’t stinky places, probably because they are open to men and women. They have carpeting and mirrors, televisions on the walls and lots and lots of fancy shiny equipment. There is also a wealth of spandex in a fitness club, far more than you would have ever seen down at Harry’s Gym in the old days.

I picked a fitness club near where I lived believing that it would be easier to haul my butt home the shorter the distance was that I had to travel after I worked out. I went to a store that specialized in athletic apparel and footwear intending to buy a sweat suit and what we used to call runners. 

The store did not carry sweat suits and runners.

Instead it had a wide range of footwear for every possible purpose. There were shoes for running indoors, shoes for running outdoors, court shoes, cross trainers, walking shoes and shoes with descriptions of things I had never heard of. They carried all the major brands including Nike, Adidas and Reebok and came in a multitude of colours from white and black to fluorescent green. They had so many different shoes on display on their walls, I knew I was going to have to ask for assistance, something I just hate doing.

The store also carried colour-coordinated training suits in shiny nylon and spandex, lots and lots of spandex. I wasn’t sure that spandex was going to accentuate my figure or that I would even be able to get into something made of spandex, so I opted for the least shiny training suit I could find and a pair of Nike trainers. 

I also bought a tote bag for $90 that I could have picked up at Wal-Mart for $15.

Fully equipped, I trundled off to the fitness club one afternoon on my way home from work, grabbed my fancy tote bag full of new athletic apparel and went in to sign up. I figured it would take a few minutes to fill out the form, pay and get changed which meant I could be home in about an hour and a half after working out.

That turned out to be a little optimistic on my part.

I was greeted by a young attractive receptionist named Tania. She had big toothy smile and even bigger hair and a perfect tan. She asked me to take a seat while she arranged for someone to assist me. A few minutes later, Ingrid emerged from a side door in a spandex training something or other and Nikes that I’m sure were even more expensive than mine. Ingrid was quite attractive,  had a perfect tan and was in very good shape which became readily apparent when she shook my hand. She had a very firm grip which made me wonder if it would recover in time to fill out whatever forms they required and write a check.

Ingrid took me to her office where we filled out those forms and then she asked me what kind of program I wanted. Program? I just wanted to work out, I didn’t need a program. Just cash my check, show me a treadmill and where the weights are and we’ll get ‘er done. Apparently that is not the way things were going to be done and Ingrid started the process by asking me my long-term objective.

I told her it was to try and avoid dying of a heart attack before I was really, really old. She just looked at me waiting for more specifics but there were none. That was my only objective.

She decided to put me under the guidance of a trainer at only a slightly extra cost who would design my personal regime. I wasn’t sure I wanted a regime or a program. I just wanted to work out and avoid dying too soon but Ingrid winked at me and assured me that Brad was one of the best. She then took me on a tour of the facility, pointing out all of the different pieces of shiny chrome-covered equipment and explained the purpose and function of each to me. 

I was becoming aware that my original estimate of being at the club for 90 minutes had been a miscalculation. Ingrid was both enthusiastic and thorough. Her tour included a significant number of up sell offers at only moderate additional costs but I declined. I was still trying to figure out what I was getting myself into.

Eventually, Ingrid took me to another office where she introduced me to a young man in a tight tee shirt and Starter training pants. His name was Brad and he wasn’t just toned, he was TONED and had a perfect tan! His abs showed through his tee shirt which made me thankful that the top of my training suit was quite loose-fitting. Brad advised me that he was going to design my fitness program with me and show me how to do each part of it. Brad was as enthusiastic and thorough as Tanya and we spent the next hour together before I was finally was able to leave without having put on my new training suit or my new Nikes. 

I promptly forgot everything Brad told me as I drove home.

Undeterred, on Saturday morning I decided to go and workout my own fitness program. I drove to the club, changed into my new outfit which I thought would make me blend in and headed for the treadmills.

I had brought my Walkman with me, dialed up some music, put the headphones on and started the machine. I’m no fool. I picked a moderate pace with minimal incline. It was Saturday after all and I didn’t see the need to start the weekend with anything too strenuous. Besides, I had to do some grocery shopping later and didn’t want to wear myself out before I got to the store. I knew I would need some reserve energy for the inevitable 35 minute wait in the line at the cash.

I was doing fairly well, jogging along almost in time to the music which gave me a degree of confidence so I inched the speed of the treadmill up a bit. I was, after all, a former distance runner. 

Directly across from me was a mirrored wall where the free weights were kept. After about ten minutes of jogging, a very attractive young woman in very tight spandex entered and walked over to the free weights directly in front of me. She stood with her back to me, looking at herself in the mirror, something I noticed a lot of people do in fitness clubs.

Her spandex suit was two-tone. The lower part was royal blue knee length and the top was bright pink that culminated in a thong-like style over the blue lower part. I figured she was probably going to do some weight training. I was wrong. Without warning, she bent over in front of me to touch the floor without bending her knees presenting her trim, firm, perfectly-formed posterior to the world or at least to me.

And that, my gentle raindrops, is the precise moment I fell off the treadmill.

Actually, I didn’t so much fall off as get thrown off. I was so captivated by the vision in front of me I forgot to keep running but the machine didn’t and threw me off directly into the guy running on the treadmill beside me. I don’t know why they put them so close together but they do. We both went down in a tangle of arms, legs and Walkman wires which caused the person on the treadmill beside him to jump off their treadmill to avoid being caught in the pile up.

That pretty much shut down the treadmill line.

There is no dignified way to extricate yourself from a situation like that. There are no words that will somehow make what happened seem perfectly normal so when some of the staff and other club members came running over expressing their concern that I might be seriously hurt, I pretended to be hurt. I felt it was better to keep them focused on being concerned about my well-being than on the fact that I was an idiot.

I accepted the assistance of one of the staff members to help me limp to the locker room where after assuring him that nothing had been broken and that I wouldn’t sue the club, I dressed and slunk out to my car with my collar turned up and my sunglasses on even though it was raining.

I didn’t go back to the club for a couple of weeks even though nothing but my pride was seriously injured and eventually I did start a regular workout regime for awhile. But I never forgot that day because it taught me that the phrase ‘pride goeth before a fall’ is wrong. It should say ‘pride goeth after a fall’ because after my fall, I had no pride left at all.  

© 2012 Maggie's Bear

all rights reserved

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Follow The Bear on Twitter: @maggsbear or connect on Facebook: Maggie's Bear