Given the fact that I am fastly approaching the age in life where the expansion of my thighs is no longer prevented by force of mind, I have unfortunately begun to turn into one of those poor souls I used to stare at incredulously from the safety of my gym’s jacuzzi: an exerciser. As such, considering that the gym is a place charged with social tension, I feel pressured to ‘fit in’ with the steady stream of twig-legged lacrosse players and gym regulars. Of course, not being a Mancunian drug dealer, I don’t actually own any tracksuit bottoms that are suitable for physical exertion. I have plenty that are suitable only for lounging and slobbing, something I am well-practiced in. Indeed, such ‘lounge pants’ as I believe they are now known, give the most unflattering, unshapely behind imaginable. If I happen to pass a mirror on such slob-days, I equate my bottom half to resembling something not unlike a blimp in appearance. I would not even dream of venturing to the gym in such apparel.
So, upon a recent trip home, I visited A Sports Shop, which, being an emporium of sports equipment, was naturally, rammed full of discounted footballs and piles of K-Swiss trainers. Happily, these gave me something to hide behind as I approached a corner containing far too much uncomfortable-looking lycra.
I grabbed the first tracksuit I saw and was asked by a salesman what sort of sport I’d be doing. “I won’t” I was tempted to reply. “I shall be selling cocaine to schoolchildren in it.” This sounded a lot better in my head. Not meaning to scandalise anyone, in reality I muttered “notsurethankyousomuch”. And no, I did not want to try it on, because I was never planning on wearing such a garment in a public place, so it didn’t matter.
So now, equipped with my in-keeping tracksuit and new, springy trainers, not to mention boob-squashing sports bra, I instantly felt revived in my need to Do Exercise. I returned to my gym a few days later, into a room that contained many implements of torture on the walls and a woman called Mary in the middle of it all. Mary, the former body-builder and all-round fitness freak, the very antithesis of anything I could ever want to aspire to in the gym world. All I could hope for was to prevent my thighs from expanding to The Chafe Stage.
The Stretching Room in the gym is an alarming place for me. I found myself standing in front of a mirror, looking at my tracksuit bottoms, whilst people all around me were gyrating their hips. Now I’ve seen elderly people in Florida doing this, so I know it is humanely possible. I could not help finding the whole situation absurd.
The main problem with my new exercise ethos has been the sheer complicatedness of it all. I’d rather prance around a ballet studio for 2 hours than “strengthen my core” with a gigantic bouncy-ball. I am struck by the sheer mind-numbing boredom that comes with a gym routine. The monotonous creaking of the treadmill, the incessant whirring of the rowing machine. And the slow-rate of improvement brought about by each breath and each stretched limb! So, as you’re stood there, strapped into some ridiculous weight machine in some uncompromising position, in your silly trousers, stultified by the tedium of it all, I start to intellectualise the process.
And I have reached an alarming conclusion, the "Catch 22" if you will: if I fail to spend several hours a day lifting things up and putting things down again, strapping by bosom into what can only be described as scaffolding, and testing the limits of my knee joints, I’ll be back in a world of of self-revulsion, plagued by thoughts of “THIGHS. THIGHS. THIGHS.” Once again, I will look upon the twig-legged Lacrosse girls with silent hatred. And if I do spend several hours a day lifting things up and putting them down again, nothing will happen. Nothing other than the certainty of having to wear my ridiculous trousers all over again.
