I was painfully shy as a child. One of my few memories from preschool days at a parent co-op nursery school goes like this: I looked at the calendar of planned activities with my mom and discovered to my great delight that we would be making playdough pizzas (basically playdough smashed into a lid with colored pasta smashed into the dough). But, when I got to school and found that the leader was one of the dads, who seemed to me at the time to be of absolutely gigantic proportions, I was too petrified to participate. I wanted to make that pizza so badly, an apparently scarred myself for life because I couldn't force myself to do it.
Anyway, as an adult I'm no longer very shy, but I do still have a GREAT discomfort with new situations. As part of my mission for self-improvement, I decided that it was time to join a gym. I used to belong to the Y, but I had a friend who I went to yoga classes and kids swimming lessons with. She showed me where everything was, and I felt fairly comfortable.
Now that Oliver will be in school every morning this year, I thought it was time to give myself a chance to work out regularly, and let Emory experience a little separation from me in the childcare area (which also forces me to come to terms with my germophobia, but that's a whole other story...). So, I picked a local gym with lots of amenities, and forced myself to go over there last night to join and take a tour. The representative I met with insisted that I sign up with an appointment to meet with a trainer and discuss my goals and the services offered, etc. I asked him if this was a physical thing and he said it was more of a meeting. I was already thinking ahead to attire. I really did not want to do this, but decided it would be a good chance for the kids to try the childcare, and I could take them for a swim.
So, this morning we headed out. I stopped by Target on the way to pick up a padlock for a locker. Little did I know, the club has the fancy schmancy lockers that have their own keys. Error #1. We arrived and even after asking for directions, wandered around confusedly until I located the childcare center. I dropped the kids off without a hitch and Emory seemed comfortable, so I headed upstairs for my appointment. Much to my chagrin, I discovered that I had to meet with the trainer in the actual fitness area (I assumed we would just sit in an office somewhere). This would be fine, except that I chose to wear a skirt and lovely little sporty maryjane-type sandals. Error #2. I wanted to get the kids to the pool easily, so they were in their swim trunks already and I put my suit on under my clothes. The skirt was perfect over my little board shorts, but not so good for what I discovered was a, gulp, fitness assessment.
The trainer looked at me like I was a total idiot, but I relaxed a little when she lead me over to a quiet table to conduct a questionnaire. On the way, I dropped the pager the child care people had given me and the clip popped off the back. Error #3. I scrambled to pick up the pieces and then we proceeded with the interview, during which time I tried to explain convincingly that my diet consists solely of rolled oats, greek yogurt, produce and lean protein. I neglected to mention the huge bowl of chocolate-peanut butter ice cream I ate at 10 pm last night, and yesterday's lunch, which was tortilla chips out of the giant Costco bag at 3 pm (does it help that they were organic?).
Our discussion ended far too quickly and she led me back to the fitness area. At which point, to my utter horrification, she wanted to me to get on a treadmill and do push-ups! Due to my inappropriate choice of attire, I vehemently declined. Error #4. I was, however, subjected to the junior high PE class style skin fold and sit and reach tests. I wanted to run screaming from the trainer, but instead hiked up my skirt to be pinched and prodded, sat on the floor and stretched over the stupid box, and stood on the scale. All in my silly skirt and sandals.
As I stood wanting to bolt, she put all my numbers into the computer and came up with some stats about my current fitness level. The scores showed that my metabolic age is 25, of course, as she informed me, they were incomplete due to my inability to complete the cardiovascular assessments (I suspect that would have upped my metabolic age to about 45). She was also quick to inform me that although I am pretty thin, I could reduce my body fat. Yes, sherlock, thank you for mentioning that. Me and probably 98 percent of all women would like to do that! She recommended a course of strength and cardio training, and suggested I sign up for personal training since it has been awhile since I've exercised regularly. Come on, lady, just let me take my yoga classes in peace!
I finally got out of there, picked up the kids and headed to the family locker room to get ready to swim. This was the point at which I discovered the key locks on the lockers. Okay, so we put our stuff in and I tried to lock it. But the key wouldn't turn. Error #5. Oliver tried it, I tried it, Oliver tried again, I tried it again and again and again, and then I stood around thinking what to do. My pride was barely intact at this point and I really didn't want to go out and ask for help in figuring out how to work this advanced piece of technology. So, I decided maybe we should just lug all our stuff to the pool with us. Fortunately, someone came into the locker room and I asked her for help. She was very kind and said, "Didn't you try your card"? I thought: What card? Where? Did I have to go somewhere to get one? What should I do? Oh - my membership card. What do you do with that? She showed me how to insert it into the back of the lock so that I could remove the key. She also showed me that the key had a safety pin back that I could attach to my clothing. Okay, so we got our key, I found some towels, and we headed out to the pool.
We had a nice swim and then came back to the family locker room to shower off. By this point, I thought I was in the clear, but no. Emory was running around in our dressing room naked and slipped on the water from the shower, fell flat on his back and banged his head. Error #6. He was okay, but I'm sure other people wondered about the shrieking coming from our room. He recovered and we all managed to get dressed, though Oliver dropped his shirt in a puddle and couldn't wear it. Whatever, I just wanted to get out of there. I ran our suits through the water extractor (which I knew how to use only from our last gym membership) and was getting ready to leave, when I discovered I didn't have my bathing suit top. I realized I left it in the shower room. Error #7. No problem, I would just go get it. Oh no! Someone was in there and the door was locked! I couldn't really knock on the door and ask a potentially naked stranger to hand me my suit, so we stood around like idiots waiting for them to come out. He finally did and I sent Oliver in to snatch the suit. Finally, our troubles had ended and we headed home.
The gym has called me twice already today to welcome me and try to get me to sign up for a 5k, a cycling team, swimming lessons, and yoga workshops. Wow, that combined with all the hours of personal training I apparently need is going to keep me very busy. Ok, people, just LEAVE ME ALONE! Let me regroup and mentally prepare myself for my first group yoga class. I will have to figure out which mat to bring, and should I even bring my own? Is it gross to use the ones they provide? Should I bring my keys/wallet into the yoga room with me, or should I put them in a locker? Its been a while since I've done yoga, I'll look like an idiot for sure. Sigh.
At least I did it, I joined the gym. Now I just have to muster the courage to go back...
No comments:
Post a Comment