YWCA Yeah!

       Before last week, I could count on one hand, with fingers to spare, the number of times I've worked out in a gym. Once was in college, when, in the few short weeks before I'd quit indoor track, the coach encouraged me to add lifting weights to my training. Working out in the windowless weight room in the basement of the gym, I'd been bored... and indignant. I ran track because I wanted to run-- outside. With a defiance of authority that I would have never dared with my beloved high school coach, I insisted on doing my indoor track workout on the outdoor track, despite the Connecticut winter cold. (Needless to say, I was not long for the team, and I never entered the weight room again.)
        The next time, it was my idea. Or sort of. Over Christmas break, I'd worked out on my father's Boflex with my brother, then a track coach and athletic trainer himself. I've always had a natural tendency to look buff. In high school, the other kids called me "She-rah," not kindly, and I was so embarrassed by my upper arms I refused to wear tank tops and searched high and low for a prom dress that would cover my arms. I got over my embarrassment, but I've always felt a little sheepish that my biceps are so defined through no real effort of my own. So, during that Christmas workout, when my brother idly mentioned the obvious-- that if I actually worked out, I'd soon have results that most people would kill for-- I resolved to join a gym.
       I was living in Oakland at the time, and the gym was across the street from Lake Merritt, whose polluted waters nonetheless sparkled brilliantly in the California sun. A novice with the machines, I felt self-conscious and out-of-place inside, while just beyond the glass doors, the lake-- with its bird sanctuary and running trail-- beckoned irresistibly. That did it-- I just wasn't a gym person, I decided. I was a runner. I literally ran out the door and never went back.
       Many times on my runs, in weather fair and foul, I have run by gyms and pitied the poor people inside. What were they doing trudging along on a treadmill when there were miles and miles to cover outside? I just didn't get it.
      After the girls were born and I'd committed to mothering full time, I was told again and again, "You should join the Y!" A membership included free childcare, and I heard many a mom sing its praises: two hours to work out and shower to oneself-- a lifesaver, really. Worth a try, I thought. But after muscling the girls' carseats into the stroller and ushering a confused and cranky Clayton through the crowded parking lot, I was already exhausted. The frenzy of bodies inside, the stench of chlorine and sweat, the chaos of the childcare room, my total lack of anonymity, with my behemoth stroller and crew of kids, the prospect of trying to squeeze it all in between nursings and naps... I just couldn't do it. I'd get up before six and run outside in the cold winter dark; the gym was just not for me.
      Nearly a year later, I saw a groupon: a two-month family membership at the YWCA. A good friend had recently raved about her dance class there and admired the community programs the organization funds through its gym memberships. Even if I don't use it, I thought, I'll have supported a good cause.
      All through the mild and glorious fall, the groupon went unused. The holidays came and went, its expiration date fast approaching. As the January doldrums set in, I thought, "Why not give it a try?" The mornings were killing me anyway. By seven, Clayton has already dismantled the couch. He and Townes jump on the springs, pretending to be--go figure-- baby zebras in a nest. By seven thirty, they are tired of it and begin to follow me around, fighting over toys and begging for stories. Dee Dee climbs on the kitchen table and tosses the salt and pepper shakers on the floor while Sylvia splashes in the dog water she's emptied onto the kitchen tile. By eight, I'm more than ready to escape the house, but it's too early and cold for the park, and none of the toddler stuff starts for hours yet. Needless to say, the gym was starting to sound pretty good.
       So, one morning after taking Clayton to school, I signed up. The girls still had diarrhea from a lingering stomach bug, and runny noses to boot, so it wasn't until the next week that the third gym experience of my life began. It does not feel like an exaggeration to say that it changed my life.
      What freedom I felt, walking back down the hall from the drop-off childcare room, with no baby on my back, not one child in tow. What luxury to read last month's New Yorker while riding the stationary bike, to fly through my novel on the elliptical. I took my first Pilates class and was amazed to find I have no "core" strength. (It turns out that without someone sitting on my feet like in elementary school, I cannot execute one single sit-up.) One morning, having forgotten my book, I took a "Pump" class for the hell of it. "It wasn't a great workout," I reported to Don that night. "I didn't even sweat." But the next morning my body ached like it hadn't since I bucked hay working at a barn at summer camp.
      I had steeled myself for tears at the drop-off, but only Clayton protested, and halfheartedly.
       On Friday, I dropped Townes and the girls off and took Clayton to check out the pool. It felt like a date, so seldom is it just him and me these days. I felt such a surge of love for him I had to stop in the hallway and give him a hug. "It's just us!" he said and threw his arms around me. After we'd been chased out of the pool (I had read the schedule wrong) we played hide and seek in the locker room. Watching him crawl into a locker-- "Now find me, Momma!"-- I felt so grateful for those few minutes for just the two of us, when I could enjoy his company without admonishing him to be gentle with his sisters or to stop bullying Townes.
       "I'm going to be in the best shape of my life," I joke, although it may well be true. But even better is the fact that we now have a destination in the morning, somewhere fun for all of us. And better yet is having a few moments to myself, to stretch on the mats with my book, to shower without anyone climbing under the shower curtain, to do those pesky abdominal exercises... More than a year after the girls were born, I feel like I'm finally taking care of someone other than my kids. And as cliche as it sounds, I'm a better mother for it.