Last week as I continued to rehab my strained achilles I mixed up my workouts a couple of times and rode my bike over to the neighborhood YMCA. It had been quite a while since I had last stepped foot in one, mainly because, while I actually enjoy working out, I absolutely hate gyms.I think it's the people.
First of all, working out is kind of a personal thing for me, and at the gym there's all of these, well … people. Sweaty geriatrics hopping on a machine while I'm in between sets, chatty Vietnamese women perched on eliptical machines inches from my own and lead-footed treadmill runners forcing me to crank Young MC up to uncomfortable levels. But let me clarify, these people aren't just any people, these are Y people. Walk into a YMCA anywhere in the country and I guarantee you'll see things you've never seen before in your life—muscle-bound guys working out in sleeveless Ts, shorts and steal-toed work boots, a random guy in Spandex shorts doing nothing but squats, retired women in velour track suits sitting on recumbent bikes reading romance novels, a guy working out in latex surgical gloves to avoid getting whatever gave the guy on the rowing machine that third eye. These are the people you don't see anywhere else outside of the River Festival.
I should be immune to just about anything the Y can throw at me, after all, between pick-up basketball games and an endless stream of odd jobs (chalking T-ball diamonds an five in the morning with a leotard-wearing contortionist, breaking up after-hours coed volleyball fights, repairing a pool with nothing but a snorkel and a caulk gun), I practically lived there. In fact, the smell of the old East Y locker room and its adjoining showers is still so firmly entrenched in olfactory system that just hearing the word spicket makes me want to throw up.
Apparently after all of these years I'm learning that the C in YMCA not only doesn't stand for cussing, it doesn't stand for Craig either.
7 comments:
You must have inhaled too much of that t-ball diamond chalk! The Y, back in the 80's, was the best. There were some straight-out ballas on the courts. There was this one really ice-cold balla who used to wear XL orange shorts, black pump-up reeboks and a bandana. Man that kid could play. He would skool his little brother on the court, and then move to the kids hoop for some vertical madness.
Those were the days.
Was that the same guy that always wore the women's sunglasses and the SPAM T-shirt he took from the lost and found? He was always hanging out with that Dietrick guy listening to death metal and scheming on ways to steal the People's Express.
Hey Guys,
That kid still has those shorts.
Must be a "Y" thing.
It seems "ah" different at the "G".
A certain guy I know, even feels safe in the sauna, while the little Asian guy does Jumping Jacks.
I did not ask "why" either?
Hey, I teach those leotard-wearing contortionists at the East Y.
It's better than the richie stuck-up Genesis. :)
Uh Lainie, this was no kid. This was a bald 60 year-old man who adorned himself in gold chains. If you've spent any amount of time around the East Y (or the River Festival Block Party), you'd know exactly who I'm talking about
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