Midwest Geek

Let me first provide you with a little background information.

• I quit smoking
• I started eating
• I gained a touch of weight
• We planned a vacation
• I realized that I need to lose weight and joined a gym

OK, since that’s out of the way, let me point out one thing. When I gained the weight that I did, I added a great deal of trouble for myself. Not a “Hey, I’m 30 pounds overweight” kind of trouble, more like “Hey, I’m 30 pounds overweight in about 30 days and my body is screaming “Put down whatever you are carrying, please!”" As you know, I can’t just put this extra weight down, I really have to get used to this new waist, or at least my body does. My pants on the other hand what nothing to do with my waist line, and if you tip toe near the closet around 5 a.m., you can hear the denim starting to whimper.

So after about 9 trips to and from the gym getting all the necessary paperwork in order, a blank check that I didn’t need, needed, didn’t need, needed, and some other odd ball paper work, I was a member of the gym. I have been a member of a gym before, it was located at my former office and while it only allowed employees, it was actually better equipped then the one I am at now, with the exception of a pool. On Black Friday while everyone else was out shopping, I decided to hit the gym figuring that there would only be a few people there, and if I did something that made me look stupid, I’d have fewer witnesses.

I got in, made my way to the locker room, changed, and headed off to the pool. Now since the pool that I am swimming in is half the length of an Olympic size pool I would need to swim from End A to End B and back to End A roughly 32 times to equal one mile. Swimming one mile was my main goal to reach by the end of the year, a mere 38 days a way. I figured that to lose the weight, this needed to be done. Once I got up to a mile and started swimming that everyday, I would be in prime shape for Hawaii in February.

Really it was no problem what so ever I thought to myself. You see I grew up swimming, and not just on the weekends or when we had a chance to make it out to a lake, I mean every freaking day. As a youngster we had a pool in the back yard, several of my friends had pools, I was on a swim team, took advanced lessons, driving instruction, and could hold my breath for close to 2 full minutes by the time I was 12 and made Aquaman look like a bitch.

I would just like to point out at this time that I am no longer 12.

As I entered the pool I circled around the elderly ladies doing water dancing or some such thing, and settled myself in a lane. The woman to my left was what I would consider elderly, around 70-75. I did a bit of stretching and started with a strong but not to overbearing freestyle stroke down the lane way. As I started swimming I noticed that I just about sank, and I had to put out a lot of energy to keep myself going. This was nothing like I remembered.

The kind woman next to me passed my like I was standing still. As I reached the mid point of my first lap I had a healthy heart beat and I realized that I needed to control my breathing. I pulled off a decent return and headed back to finish my first lap and thought that 30 minutes should do it since I have not swam like this in so long. By lap three my head began to hurt and I could not for the life of me control my breathing. The elderly lady at this time switched over to the Butterfly stroke. After a total of about 5 full laps I had to stop and take a breather. My heart was damn near close to 200 beats per minute (my wife says that’s bad), I was huffing and puffing hard enough to blow down all the pigs houses, and my brain was pounding against the side of my head.

And the lady next to me did a perfect return for another lap.

It was at this time that I felt it was time to remove myself from the pool in case I should drown. The drowning part wasn’t really bothering me, it’s the fact that a senior freaking citizen would have had to save me. I toweled off and looked out the windows, realizing that I should maybe get in a bit more exercise before staring one of the three most physically intensive exercises. As I headed for the locker room to change and mend my totally shattered ego, the fifth Golden Girl stopped long enough to look up, wave a hello and head off on yet other lap down the pool.

The treadmill is my new friend.