According to gym

If you had asked me a couple of years ago whether I was a gym person, I would have replied, “The gym? You mean that place with all the weights and whirring machines and grunting men? Get outta here!” Then I would have pointed at you and laughed, ’cause I’m a tool.

 

Turns out the joke is on me. Here I am, a grunting man with weights in my hands, wondering how on earth I ended up standing in front of a wall-length mirror next to a beefcake clad in a Spider-Man T-shirt. I’m pretty sure he’s wearing cologne to cover up the stink of his sweat, which frankly isn’t working. He just smells like a lilac with armpits.

 

I feel like an intruder.

 

It’s not that I’m a stranger to exercise, exactly. It’s just that, until recently, my workouts have been private affairs – long walks along the banks of a river, quiet bicep curls at home, and maybe some haphazard situps to put a dent in a gut that looks like half a melting coconut. Only in solitude can I let go of self-consciousness and achieve my Zen state, which is another way of saying that I generally look like an ignorant boob while doing this kind of stuff. Full disclosure: I also look like an ignorant boob while not doing this kind of stuff.

 

Then the back injury happened, and the physical therapy, and a new mission statement emerged – to fortify my spine by strengthening the muscles that support it. That meant ditching my humble home setup in favor of the gym’s ample offerings. It also meant taking my scarecrow-esque gyrations out where they could be readily seen and scrutinized, which naturally filled me with trepidation. I’d have been more comfortable with a directive to pee in front of a panel of judges.

 

I figured I was in for a strange world. I wasn’t wrong.

 

The first thing you notice when you walk into the gym is that everyone’s a blur of motion, but nobody’s actually going anywhere. This is in contrast to everyday life, in which people are going somewhere, but at a pace that makes growing grass look like the Indy 500. The second thing you notice is the smell. Apparently, when you work out, your burned-up calories evaporate and collect in the atmosphere like steam, only this calorie-steam brings back memories of when your brother tried to suffocate you with a pair of used socks in middle school. Sidebar: Why did humans evolve to be stinky when they sweat? Think of how much more pleasant exercise would be if we emitted dryer sheet odors during squat thrusts.

 

That’s all stuff you get used to, though. What’s tougher to overcome – at least if you’re a wallflower – is the sense of intimidation.

 

Take the guy next to me in the Spider-Man shirt. His biceps alone are the size of small dogs; he probably gets a decent workout just lifting his arm to pick his nose. Between sets, he walks around with his chest puffed out as if to say, “I’m a bro, bro. I could armwrestle Godzilla and win, bro. I drink protein shakes and own many pairs of neon-colored running shoes. Bro.”

 

To be clear, it’s not his physical strength that intimidates me. I could totally take him in a fight, mostly ’cause I’m kinda weird and I cheat a lot. It’s just that he’s so much better at this whole workout thing than I am. Look at him! He’s lifting 45-lb. weights over his head and smiling! His form is perfect! Meanwhile, in my attempts to gradually re-build a brittle body, I look like a gazelle with a broken leg trying to get out of the way of traffic.

 

What separates a gym person from a non-gym person is not physique, but mindset. People of all shapes and sizes go there, which is awesome – that’s how it should be. But you don’t see a lot of overly neurotic people working on their pecs. Crippling neurosis has always been my great downfall when it comes to doing pretty much anything in a public space. This includes breathing and existing.

 

My main problem is that I think too much. The woman on the stair machine, the dude doing leg lifts – I worry that they’re watching my attempts at rehab and silently mocking me, and honestly I couldn’t blame them if they were. Because of my oddly-shaped frame and gangly limbs, it’s a veritable comedy show when I walk across a room, let alone bang out crunches on a medicine ball. Think of a drunk guy trying to get to his feet after stumbling into a rosebush. That’s more or less what it looks like.

 

In reality, it’s likely that no one cares how I look, and can’t be bothered to expend precious energy on mocking. But I obsess, because I do mock. I’ve got it coming, and it’s only a matter of time before someone derisively notes that I’m wearing white socks with black windpants.

 

I’ve gradually become accustomed to going to the gym, like any routine. In my case, it’s worth the imagined public shaming, since my upper back in particular is no longer feeble, like a collapsing accordion. The body is an amazing machine; given enough time and patience, you can direct its development to an uncanny degree, even if you create a YouTube-worthy spectacle in the process. It shouldn’t matter what other people think, because improved health is the endgame, and there are many roads that lead to this goal.

 

But that doesn’t mean I’ll ever think of myself as a “gym person,” per se. I don’t own nearly enough Spandex. Is that a stereotype? That’s probably a stereotype.

 

My good buddy Spider-Man just re-racked his weights and headed back toward the changing room. Not a moment too soon, if you ask me. Maybe now I can finally concentrate.