09 May 2007 | My Gym: The Regulars
My gym’s just a block and half away, at the corner of Union and 7th, in a basement. They tried to make it nice—and I suppose they succeeded—but it’s still in a basement. There are no windows. This bothered me at first, but now I don’t think about it so much. My gym is my gym.
I go nearly every morning. Most days my trip to the gym is the only time I leave the apartment, and the people I see there are the only people I see all day, aside from K and the occasional delivery person.
I rarely talk to anyone at the gym, but I notice everyone. I notice them and think about them and often make up little stories about them. I do this anyway, wherever I go, but the gym is ideal because I see the same people over time, the regulars. I like the regulars. I’m a regular myself.
Sometimes I’ll spot a regular on the street, and if I’m with K, I’ll turn and say something like, “That woman in the blue dress belongs to my gym. I told you about her. She wears sweatpants that say YALE across her butt.” But K rarely remembers any of these people.
I tell her about them in the morning as we’re eating our oatmeal. I call these my gym stories. I have a new one every day. I think K finds it both funny and disturbing that so much of my social life, such as it is, takes place at the gym, and that so little of it consists of any actual interaction with anyone.
