gym

If I had to name one single thing that I missed about my life in New York, it would be my wonderful New York gym. It was just a few blocks from our apartment, loaded with all of the newest and nicest equipment, and basically always empty. Sure, the completely saturated workout facility market in New York must be tough on the owners, but it worked in our favor. I am told that John Travolta worked out at our gym, though I never saw him there and although it doesn’t seem like he spends a lot of time on the treadmill. In any case, it was nice.

Our new gym in Missoula is located in a strip mall, has some working equipment, and is populated by the same five guys who are always standing around not quite lifting anything. I mean, it’s not so bad. Part of the issue is that I’ve been having knee problems the last few months and I’m stuck on the stationary bike a lot, something that Ben describes as only being marginally better exercise than sitting on the couch. Worse, though, is that the stationary bikes at this gym have the following written on them:

“Stop exercising if you feel pain, faint, dizzy, or out of breath.”

Yeah. I know. A parallel structure nightmare. And I have to stare at it for 30 minutes a day. It’s like driving by a flaming seven-vehicle car crash that you can’t help but stare at, except that it’s with nouns and adjectives. It’s a word crash.

Now, I’m not a grammar expert by any stretch of the imagination, but this sentence follows me through the day like a terrible parallel structure ghost, shaking its chains and turning my blood cold with its crappy sentence balance. Whenever I’ve made a list in my head lately, it sounds something like:

“I need to mail those thank-you notes, buy some silverware, and pain.”

Or:

“Today I’m writing two press releases, some brochure copy, out of breath, and two web pages.”

I also often imagine a terrifying world in which people talked like that and it went totally unnoticed. For example, I might imagine a man sitting in a doctor’s office and explaining that his symptoms make him feel “faint and pain.” Or I think about two joggers finishing up a marathon, where one of them turns and says, “I’m dizzy,” and the other one says, “I’m pain.”

If you are thinking, “why don’t you just look somewhere other than the tiny 8-point font grammar mistake written on the bike, like maybe, for instance, at the TV directly in front of the bike? Or even the wall?” then I don’t think we’ll ever truly understand one another.

Many of you are familiar with cell phone guy, a douchebag (and I do not use that term lightly) at my gym who is constantly calling his guy friends and having inane conversations with them about a narrow spectrum of topics that range from the digital quality of the most recent celebrity sex tapes to whether or not cell phone guy could do a better job on the field than one Yankee player or another.

He seems to have a bad case of the short guy complex, an even worse case of facial hair, and an overall obnoxious demeanor. He’s got that thing going where he is constantly trying to convince everyone around him that he’s cool, and I hate that thing.

When I had a real job with real hours, cell phone guy and I used to go to the gym at the exact same time every day and, without fail, I would end up having to hear him talk to some buddy about riveting subjects such as how he was totally at the gym working out. It drove me mad - to the point at which I one day walked up to him and yelled, simply, “Cell phone!” He did not take it well, but he also did not stop his chatty behavior. In fact, I’m pretty sure that after the shouting incident, he started picking elliptical machines close to me and began calling more and more people.

Thankfully, at about this time, I quit my job - a move that not only improved my sanity career-wise but that also allowed me to go to the gym earlier in the day. Cell phone guy seemed to be in my past. However, as the weeks go by, I find myself missing our contentious relationship, to the point where I enjoy showing up at the gym so that our workouts overlap by only five minutes or so - long enough for me to get a good long glare in and long enough for me to have that mini day dream where I get to refer to him as “Chatty Cathy” (Ben’s name for him) to his face.

In fact, I have a few mini hateful daydreams about him. I picture him living his lame life, perhaps spending too much time each morning sculpting his utterly disgusting goatee-stache, perhaps lying about his height on an online dating site, perhaps wondering what it would be like to actually have sex with a girl. I revel in the fact that talking on the cell phone prevents him from going fast enough on his elliptical for him to see any results. I love assuming that the people he is calling are either all in prison or all in his role-playing club.

Here’s the point: I think I have an unhealthy, hate-filled relationship with this guy. And, more than that, he might not even give me a passing thought - an idea that makes me even angrier. Cell phone guy is a recurring character in my life and in my imagination, and he might not even be taking the time to hate me back.

Is this normal? Do you see people in your everyday lives that you have constructed entire lives and personalities for? More than that, do you ever hate these people? Or is it always the cute girl at the coffee shop who hands you your cinnamon bagel every morning, and are you just imagining how wistful and quirky and lonely she is all day?

I think I have a problem. I’m just not sure what that problem is. For the time being, I’m going to assume my problem is, plainly and simply, cell phone guy.

Entering our gym yesterday, Ben and I noticed a new sign taped on the door advertising a Valentine’s Day Sale in which you could get your sweetheart a membership and some private sessions for a reduced cost. We both thought this was odd and probably a bad idea - but assumed that it was an isolated case of a bad marketing idea. But - low and behold, my friend Brian also saw a similar sign at a different gym in a different borough.

I can see it now — men making this mistake all throughout New York City: “Hey honey! For Valentine’s Day I got you that gym membership that you’ve never mentioned you wanted!”

Now, don’t get me wrong: I can envision a situation in which this would be an acceptable V-Day gift. For example, if your girlfriend or wife already has a membership at said gym and the membership is about to expire, and if your girlfriend was also untraditional enough to want something practical for Valentine’s Day instead of, say, a pink talking stuffed dog.

However, for the most part, I think that this is a BAD gift idea for a woman on the most romantic of fake holidays. Why not just sit her down on Valentine’s Day and explain to her that you are no longer physically attracted to her? Why not just take out the middleman and break up with her?

Lord knows I’m no expert on women, but I’ve watched enough Lifetime Original Movies to understand that whatever you give her on Thursday better 1) be pink and heart-shaped and 2) not imply that she needs to put in some time on the treadmill.

Or have we misinterpreted this V-Day gym membership sale entirely? Are you supposed to get a gym membership for yourself, so that you improve your looks and stamina for your partner? I think that might be a little too abstract. Maybe we should stick to flowers and boxes of chocolates.

Of course, I should mention that Ben and I don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day - or we do, but only as a joke. I think last year we went to the grocery store and bought one of those giant heart-shaped cookies together and then ate way too much of it while watching TV. It was kind of gross.

I recently tried out a new machine at the gym: it’s made by Life Fitness and called the Summit Trainer. As you can see from the picture, it’s a lot like if an elliptical trainer and a stair climber got it on and had a baby. It mimics a hiking motion and is really pretty hard but rewarding.

I liked it a lot - it’s one of those in-between machines that tones your muscles while you get a cardio workout at the same time. And after I added it to my weekly grab bag of gym activities, I started noticing how well the machine worked out my butt. I’m talking about a noticeable physical difference as well as general mental ass-esteem. As someone who despises squats and lunges and as someone who has beat up knees, it was totally awesome to find an ideal glute exercise.

I also noticed that the other people who used the Summit Trainer also had nice asses - sure, their asses were of all shapes and sizes, but every last ass of the regular Summit users was, in their own way, generally looking gooood.

Here’s the thing, though: why is it called the Summit Trainer? To me, the word summit brings to mind Everest, crampons, crags, and possibly getting lost until you are dead or at least until you are hungry. If I really wanted to summit something, maybe I wouldn’t be a half-block from my house at the gym, I’d be somewhere in the wilderness, getting to the top of things for no reason.

It is at these moments that I once again lament not being an advertising big wig in charge of everything. It took me over a year before I even tried the Summit Trainer. But what if it had been named something a little closer to my actual experience? Closer to its greatest feature? What if it were called the Ass Machine?

I can see the commercial now - a woman sitting at her kitchen table, hands curled around a steaming cup of coffee, talking candidly to the camera. “The Ass Machine really effected my ass,” she would explain, as if she were talking to her close friend. “It’s fun to do, it’s challenging, and you feel and see results.” She would smile, take a sip from her mug, and say, “I don’t give a crap about climbing things. I just want a powerful, slap-worthy caboose.”

Sometimes I really wonder how I could possibly be unemployed.

I’m trying out a new little feature today - a little bulleted entry that’s kind of like a to-”done” list of things that affected my day. Let me know how it goes. Is it too boring, indulgent, or both? Let’s hope for both!

• I finally walked up to Guy Talking On His Cell Phone At The Gym. I walked up to him and I didn’t say, “Please don’t talk on your cell phone,” or “Your constant cell phone usage ruins my cardio workouts at least three days a week,” or, “The gym is for working your body, not your mouth.” But, no, I walked up to him, looked him in the eyes, and simply said, “CELL PHONE” and walked away. He then made a couple of lame comments about me to his friend but I take comfort in the fact that he didn’t have the nuts to walk up to me and say anything to my face. He’s in the running for a Douchebag of the Year Award, no question (that’s going to be another new blog feature, maybe).

• I got in separate fights with both of my parents over politics today. I don’t like this. We’re all stubborn, and, although my parents raised me with Southern values, I was raised, geographically, in Boston. You know what that means. I know they’re wiser than me and in a way know better, but I also know that I truly feel and know what I feel and know. Mostly, I don’t think it’s a good idea to talk about these issues with my parents and that I should have restrained myself. Mostly, it’s taking every inch of my will (will comes in inches, right?) not to have BROOD officially endorse Barack Obama in the coming days. We’ll see how this pans out - I also don’t want to bring politics to my blog just like I don’t want to talk with my parents about politics. Kind of.

• Both of the above points obviously stem from how badly my job has been going since the big merge on January first. I no longer have time to rest or think or even take lunch (or write regular blog updates! Or write in general!) during the day, and the whole time I’m bitter about the fact that I’m working with twice the book list, twice the bosses, and the same exact pay. I need something. I shouldn’t be crying every day when I get home from work and I shouldn’t be lashing out at my parents or even at Guy Talking On His Cell Phone At The Gym, even though I’m somewhat sure he should be shot to keep his chatty genes from being passed on. I just feel very enraged these days. Anyone have New York City job leads? I’ll try anything that involves keeping most my clothes on. I’m serious. I know a few of you will write (maybe both my dad and Ben’s dad) and tell me it’s not so bad, but I also know that if I fill in one more fiscal spreadsheet, I will lose a part of my soul. I need something different. I need to lose a different part of my soul for a change.

• Being enraged also means being emotional in general. Today I came home from work and found that Ben had cleaned the kitchen. I don’t mean that he simply washed the dishes, I mean that he cleaned even the inside of the refrigerator and, therefore, emptied about a dozen terrifying old leftover Tupperware horrors that have been sitting there for months. These horrible leftovers were so terrifying that I’m not sure I could have done it without crying and jumping up and down a little in that grossed out way. But as you can guess, when I walked into the kitchen after work today I cried. Because I am an emotional wreck with a great boyfriend.

January 2nd is an extraordinary day at the gym. The number one resolution each year is to be healthier, and, after recovering from their hangovers on January 1st, people stampede to the gym in droves. It feels a lot like the first day of camp or something - new and nervous faces and a lot of bunching shorts. Of course, unlike camp, most people won’t make it a month.

I like seeing the new people, but I don’t like the crowded locker room or waiting for machines. More specifically, I don’t like that some woman was using my unofficial locker, which she should have obviously known was mine through either ESP or osmosis. I don’t like watching someone misuse weights and ignore the advice of the personal trainer who comes over to help.

It’s on these rare days that the gym regulars that I usually can’t stand (The Grunter, Guy Who Only Works Out His Biceps And Nothing Else, The Samurai, Guy Talking On His Cell Phone At The Gym) are my unlikely allies. When, for example, a newbie is somehow taking up an entire bench in the locker room with her shit, I can lock eyes with Girl Who Thinks She Is A Boxer Even Though She’s Really Just An Owner Of Boxing Gloves and, for one moment, not hate her with my entire heart.

Still, there’s something thrilling about seeing the new guys. It’s kind of like that scene in Shawshank Redemption when all the new prisoners arrive and the old prisoners bet on who’s going to cry first - everyone remembers their first day. On one hand, you want everyone to survive. On the other hand, you want to think that you were special simply by surviving yourself.

I like to guess who’s going to stay. Most people fade out and completely disappear by the middle of February. A handful keep showing up - even during the coldest days of the last half of the winter, even after it heats up, even if something goes wrong in their lives. It’s like guessing who’s going to get shot in a war movie.

For example, last year on January second, I noticed a big guy with a scruffy beard who was new - the kind of guy you see in Queens that is obviously a recent immigrant from any number of vague Eastern European countries that didn’t exist when I took geography in sixth grade. He was half-jogging, half-running on the treadmill and looking shy although pretty damn determined. He was there every single day until I switched gyms last spring, but I still see him at the local grocery store sometimes, looking utterly transformed. We still nod at each other - like we’ve been though something together (camp or prison or war, according to my lame mixed metaphors).

But for every determined scraggly bearded guy, there were ten people I saw today who won’t make it to next week. Some of them are easy to pick out: the girls with the brand new matching workout outfits that look like something Aerobics Barbie would slip into for her new animated video. The dudes who come to lift weights in jeans and work boots. The girl who tries to do the stair climber with chandelier earrings.

It all works out in the end, though. The people who stay are the people who we, the motley crew of regulars with our own idiosyncrasies, would like to stay, for the simple reason that they want to stay. If they keep coming, they’ll learn. The awkward mom who didn’t quite understand how to do the rowing machine will perfect it in a month. The 70-year-old grandfather who walks on the treadmill for 30 minutes each day will learn to not wear dress socks. The hipster chick with the leg warmers will soon enough trade in her five-pound weights for ten-pound weights, and then fifteen. Soon enough, we’ll all be nodding at each other in the grocery store. It’s a good feeling.

You might think that I date Ben because he’s loving and supportive. Or because he’s an ambitious and successful sports writer. Or because he’s smart and hilarious and inquisitive and fun.

But you’d all be wrong. I keep Ben around because he used to be a personal trainer and for years now I’ve been taking advantage of his free advice and training sessions. The way I look at it, I’m practically making $60 every time we go to the gym together. Sure, when we go out I have to deal with girls flinging themselves at his chiseled six-pack like how birds fly into windows and sure, I have to deal with making him feel better every time someone makes fun of the place where his neck is supposed to be - but it’s all worth it for the free health and fitness advice.

Like yesterday, for example, when we completed the Dread Circuit. The Dread Circuit is the hardest workout routine we do - and we do it probably two to three times a week. It consists of 20 minutes of throw-up-in-your-mouth ab work and 40 minutes of cardio weightlifting. Cardio weightlifting, for those not familiar, is exactly like regular weightlifting except that your body is on fire and you can’t breathe the whole time.

Still, even though this sounds bad, it’s probably the most challenging and rewarding physical undertaking I complete all week. And it makes the next day’s workout (cardio and light lifting) feel as easy and free as eating a tub of popcorn while watching Dr. Phil in my underwear.

And that’s just one of the many really general things I’ve learned. Here are some more:

A gym buddy makes everything better. I really don’t know how people go to the gym every day alone, without someone to hold them accountable. As totally awesome as I feel on my way home from the gym, I usually feel a lot more like huddling in the dark in a fetal position while moaning when I get home from work. Ben confirmed it: the people who are consistent and the people who succeed almost always have a buddy to help them out along the way - to honk with the car running in the driveway, to spot you when you’re weight-lifting, and to keep you in check.

Routine is good, but so is variety. Before I knew Ben, I did the same exact things at the gym every time I went. Even though it’s good to consistently show up at the gym it’s not good to consistently do 30 minutes on the elliptical and then do the same ten ab exercises. You have to constantly shock and surprise your body - and make sure you’re working everything and not wearing out the same six muscles day after day. For cardio, mix the elliptical with the stationary bike and the treadmill and the stair climber, for example. Ben, who is a superstar, mixes weights, cardio, boxing, jujitsu, yoga, circuits, and Pilates.

If you’re a girl, don’t be afraid of bulking up. Ben said something he always heard from women who were starting workout plans was that they didn’t want to lift weights because they didn’t want to look like a man. To which Ben said, seriously, don’t worry about it. Unless you’re really lucky, the only things weightlifting will do to you is tone your body and distribute your weight better, help you burn fat, and strengthen your bones. Oh, and it makes you feel awesome. It won’t make you look like the Hulk - women have a natural layer of body fat, not to mention we just don’t have the hormones to jack up like men do.

Really, don’t be afraid of the gym in general. In my pre-Ben years, I was certain that everyone at the gym 1) looked like models 2) knew exactly what they were doing 3) would stare at me for a moment, then nudge their model friend, then point, then laugh. But now I know that the gym is filled with helpful, normal-looking people who are generally excited that you, too, are at the gym. If you don’t know how to use a piece of equipment, don’t hesitate to ask someone - I recommend the funny, supportive guy with neck-esteem issues.

…and don’t be afraid of the free weights. Even after I was comfortably going to the gym, I was terrified of the free weights section, where the grunty men with back braces would congregate. I made up excuses not to learn free weights (which I now love and prefer) because I “didn’t want to encroach on their space” or “look like an idiot with my 8-pound baby weights.” To which Ben responded, “Screw them.” It’s a good philosophy in general.

Just because you went to the gym doesn’t mean you worked out. You have to push yourself even after you’ve motivated yourself to walk through the door. There’s this one woman I see at the gym every day reading a fitness magazine and pedaling on the reclined bike like she’s driving her grandfather to church. This woman probably thinks that she works out for an hour everyday when in fact she’s only doing some light reading. There’s also a guy who is there everyday who stands around where the weights are in his badass workout outfit, not doing much except talking about how much he can bench (if he ever tried it out). He should at least be looking for wherever his sleeves went.

Don’t feel bad if you miss a day. Don’t sacrifice your social life. Don’t miss that totally awesome Lifetime Movie about kidnapping newborns. Don’t beat yourself up if you just feel too tired or sick or just need a break. However, try not to miss two days in a row (if you’re not sick or injured), because two days usually turns into three. This week, for example, I want to go out after work on Friday when I’d usually be at the gym. So I’m getting up a little early to do some living room yoga.

Know the difference between “the burn” and pain. It’s good to work hard, but it’s just as important to know when to stop or when to take a day off. A good rule of thumb is that you should have to take a shower when you get home and possibly burn your gym clothes. You should not have to cry while taking the shower. Being uncomfortable isn’t always bad, and pushing yourself is the only way that you’ll improve. On the other hand, an injury will keep you out of the gym for days or weeks and set you back.

Take advantage of your free personal training session. You usually get one when you join a new gym, and if you don’t you can usually ask for one and get it. He or she will show you how to use all the machines correctly and give you a basic routine that’s right for your goals. For free! You probably don’t even have to sleep with him if you don’t want to.

Exercise makes you feel awesome. Duke did a study recently that showed that exercise works just as well as antidepressants. And while I don’t recommend you drop your meds and start jogging, I’ve found going to the gym feels to me very similar to meditating. You clear your mind and focus on your body. After a few weeks, even though I looked almost exactly the same (and even put on a few pounds because I was building muscle), I had so much more plain love for the awesome and wonderful machine that my body was.