Gym rat!!

I'm not a gym rat, per say, but I do like to hit the gym on a fairly regular basis. There are, if you have never been to the gym, several types of people that go as described by my buddy GKL.

The gym, for the uninitiated, is a fascinating place due almost entirely to the people whom attend. I, myself, find that each plays a vital role in the dynamics of the gymnasium.

For example, let us take the ‘grunters’. These gargantuans of groan, giants of gasp, behemoths of bellow, gye-normo-cons of, er, gro-asp-ellow act as the conscious for those of us who may tend to lose focus. They startle us with their sudden explosions of expletives, clankings, boomings, boastings, and beratings. I sometimes find myself, after such an explosion, running to the 2.5 lb dumbbells and squeezing out two or three hard won repetitions in a flurry of guilt and reapplied will power.

The ‘maintainers’, as JKL pointed out, are the sane ones. These are the people that you see all the time and, unlike the ‘grunters’, are not afraid to make eye contact. They offer a soothing familiarity to the gym. When you see them and you think, hey, there is that one guy/gal, and you give them the ‘lip-thrust-head-nod-eye-brow-scrunch’ which is how maintainers recognize each other. It is sort of like the gym equivalent of a ‘Hey, how ya doin?’ without losing the much needed focus for exertions and strenuations (I just made that word up… Feel free to use it as you see fit) on silly greetings and banalities.

Now, JKL’s ‘poser’ category is too broad. It should be split thusly:

‘Displayers’: This is the women/men who come into the gym with little to no coverings. The women tend to be enhanced, scientifically speaking, about the upper torso region and wear a degree of makeup that runs the gambit from copious to subtle. The men tend to focus most of their efforts in the gym to the upper torso region and wear spaghetti strap tanks and have trouble scratching their own behinds. They both walk with their heads turned to the side so as to see their glory reflected in the many, ah, reflective surfaces (reflective surfaces are a necessary furnishing requirement at most gyms) as they walk to and from machinery and drinking supplies. The role of ‘displayers’ for me is that, with some exceptions, they are pleasing to watch. They bounce, swagger, sashay, swish, jiggle, and flaunt their way around the gym in a manner that is quite pleasing at times. Being an aesthetician, I have an eye for these displays of pumped and prepped fleshy parts.

‘Seasonals’: The ‘seasonals’ are the most irritating, if only because they tend to flood the gym and occupy equipment that is otherwise and normally freely available. These are the people that show up because of 1) resolutions, 2) spring is coming, or 3) summer is coming. They are a temporary bunch and they slowly dwindle away after a couple of weeks of what originally was going to be a defining lifestyle change but which turns out to be a whole lot more work than it is worth. One of the good things about the ‘seasonals’ is that them occupying my space lets me focus more on the ‘displayers’ between sets and or exercises... that is until the next startling bellow.

The one really fascinating category I would like to add is:

‘Bored house wife (BHW)’: These are by far the most entertaining. They are part ‘displayer’ and part ‘maintainer’ with a social piece tossed in for good measure. They have wedding rings with rocks the size of a small planet or they don’t wear rings at all. They come in groups, wear very aesthetically pleasing outfits and have bodies that result when you can focus both time and money. They tend to be dedicated to working out, but they also have ample time for socializing. Did I mention the aesthetically pleasing outfits? The ‘BHWs’ are normally very entertaining to speak with during the ‘seasonals’ seasons and they are sometimes distracting enough that the ‘grunters’ best efforts at boomings, clankings, screachings and scroamings (yes, scroamings) tend to fall on unfocused ears.