As man wages a battle against undefeated Father Time, he sometimes turns to heavy metal.
Some guys go heavier than others. You give those suckers a wide berth, particularly the few who sprinkle each meal with steroids. Heavily muscled and angry is not a good combination.
Any gym is a study in humanity, particularly one that appeals to the broader community, like the YMCA. The combination of interesting people and exercise is a great pathway out of a brooding head.
There’s Ben, my 88-year-old-or-so pal. Emptias, a soft-spoken, middle-aged Muslim physician. Buttoned-down Terry at the counter, an avid runner just starting to get my sense of humor. Or not.
Each gym has its culture and vibe, I’m guessing. The Y, as it is now called, is an all-comers place. You can’t rent a corner room there anymore, a la Barney Fife, but the Y is still more than a gym, befitting its original Christian affiliation.
I love how the lobby smells. No, it doesn’t stink. It just smells like the Y, the same way each place has a smell. You take in the aroma, the lady tennis players through the glass on the left, the loafers on the furniture. You see a lot if you’re looking. That’s all I ask out of life. Something interesting to break up all the have-to orders.
You’ve got your swim team kids, whose prepubescent voices sound like a gaggle of parakeets in the locker room. They make quite a din, but I’m struck by how much more they know at their age than I did at the same juncture. The other day, one young kid received a lecture on the penal system from a teenager he must have known.
“You don’t get a simple fine for murder!” I heard the older one say. “You might get something called parole, but that’s after you’ve been to prison!”
The phone gazers occupy machines as if they are at home. I try to be nice in cutting in, because my obsessive trips to the water fountain don’t guarantee my spot upon returning. Ye who is without sin, you know.
You see all shapes and sizes, male and female. No one should be embarrassed to work out. If you’re overweight, screw everybody who might or might not be judging you. Tend to business. I’ve never, ever heard anyone making fun of anyone at the Y. That’s the truth.
Time was, I used to hang out with the squatters and dead lifters. Both latter activities have left me with a semi-sore right hip. Most of my 50-and-over brethren have followed suit in abandoning such rigor.
A friend of mine is only a few years younger but refuses to cede an inch to age. I admire his physique and determination, but am afraid he will confront injury on his arduous CrossFit path. Pretty sure he already has.
CrossFit is a game for youth, as Mick Jagger once sang of making love and breaking hearts. I see those poor souls jogging up and down Piedmont Road as if led to a cliff, machine guns behind them. Running is part of the program. But hey, different strokes.
There’s also the locker room culture, a world unto its own.
Some younger men seem self-conscious about their bodies, which is counterintuitive. You’ll never look any better, believe me, yet many bolt for the safety of three or four curtained spaces in the back.
The curmudgeon in me wonders if young men are taught this timid sensitivity, along with how toxic their masculinity is. Anecdote tells me women have sadly been trained to hide their bodies behind closed doors, but men scurrying to change in private is new to me. Junior high football cured me of that.
Men 50 and older need the mental and emotional benefit of exercise as much as the physical. We tend to sequester ourselves. Women are much better at maintaining their friendships, to their wisdom and credit.
It’s a wondrous thing to be paroled, if only for an hour or two.
