So, this past Wednesday, I decided to mix up my schedule and go to my local recreation center mid-week. In my mind, I figured since I had a bit of time off, it wouldn’t hurt to get an extra workout in, right? That’s what I thought without fully comprehending that it was…
Wait for it…
Wednesday!
Everything started out all right; I locked up my gym bag in the locker room, went through the gym and did all my reps on the machines, utilized the cable weight contraption, ran a bit on the elliptical and then decided to wrap it up and enter the ladies’ locker room.
I have to note here that this rec center is very odd regarding the lady’s locker room. I’d never been inside, much less joined, a gym that set up a women’s locker room similar to a high-school boy’s locker room. While it was clean enough, it only consisted of two L-shaped walls of lockers with a row of open showers in between. Did you catch that? OPEN showers where all the ladies have to shower in public next to each other. True, there were little “walls” between each shower, but no closed-in areas, you’d still have to walk in and out of the public area, in the nude, just to retrieve a towel. There were absolutely no personal rooms to clean up or change in privately. I imagine this is how it must be in prison. By the time I figured this out… after I’d joined for the year, I had deduced two things; First, I will never again assume that any given locker room will actually be adequate, regardless of the price of membership. I’ll always check it out first! And second, whenever I attend this rec center, I needed to plan to just do the basics in this penitentiary set-up locker room and leave asap.
After understanding the set-up of this locker room, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the toilets on the other side were actually in stalls and had doors that closed. A long row of open, attached sinks were parallel to toilet stalls. Above those sinks was the only mirror in the locker room quarters. At this point, I realized that I’d pass on using that mirror to brush through my hair… the mirror atop the sinks that had absolutely no vanity area or console table to set anything down as multiple ladies who had just publicly exhibited themselves to each other in the showers were now attempting to dry their hair in front of it. There were combs, bags, brushes, and devices that needed plugged in, lined up all over the wet floor. Wtf? That’s safe, right? (really, wtf?)
I guess I would say at least they had outlets; however, all those plug ends soaking in the water puddles under everyone – well, it just didn’t look so safe.
From that point, I went back to the locker where I’d stowed my bag. As I brushed through my hair, an elderly lady literally groaned at me and told me that I didn’t have enough stuff in the locker to use it. She seemed pleasant enough, but still asked if I could just take my stuff out of the locker and go away because she was still going to be in and out of her locker, which was on the same wall as mine. I wasn’t sure what to make of her benign request, but as she spoke and struggled with reaching into her locker, I gathered that perhaps she wanted more space to herself, so I kindly removed my bag, closed my locker, and stepped across that space to a wet bench behind the the shower entryway. She seemed satisfied with my relocation, but then looked over at me and said “Oh, you’re still here?”
“Yes,” I answered, “I’m just cleaning up a bit.” I obviously wasn’t planning to go into the naked group shower den, so she walked around the corner (to the mirror I’d assumed), leaving her locker wide open as the many grocery bags began to bow and sag, dropping those items they’d contained. I figured I’d just put on some deodorant and leave the inmates to their penal labor, so I pulled out my dove spray and spritzed my pits.
“Oh my God!” a shrill voice erupted from behind me, “You did not just spray aerosol, did you?”
“Yes, it’s called deodorant,” I shockingly stated.
“Oh my God,” she repeated as she briskly walked right up next to me and took a huge sniff, “I can’t believe you did that! First, you’re in my area, and now you’ve made it so I can’t even be here!” She threw her arms up and continued to moan loudly with “Oh my God, I can’t believe this” and “this is my area” thrown into her groaning mix.
Wtf? Wouldn’t a person be relieved that someone in a crowded naked enclosure area put deodorant on as opposed to just standing there stinking the place up? I seriously didn’t know what to apologize for or say... that I'm so sorry I didn't want to smell too bad after I worked out, so I put on deodorant in the lady’s locker room?
Wtf?
At that point, I attempted to calmly tell the lady I was sorry I used deodorant, that I’ll leave. Her arms continued to flail about as her voice resumed piercing the small area, “It doesn’t matter now if you leave or stay, it’s what you’ve done! You ruined my room! You sprayed aerosol!”
That was the last thing I’d heard as I grabbed my bag and bolted out of the locker room. I was completely disillusioned as this lady was easily in her late 80s to early/mid 90s. You can’t backtalk or argue with someone that age, can you?
Later that day, as I contemplated if I’d submit to the punking attempts of a woman in her 90s and allow this locker-room bully to keep me away from the workout room, a friend of mine pointed out that most people, who are well over 80 years old, that she knows are grumpers and yellers. She had previously told her kids that, as they age, they’ll go thru life in reverse; they’ll end up losing significant cognitive functioning, along with not having an abundance of reasoning abilities, nor body control for that matter... Basically, they’ll revert back into toddlers, but toddlers who have money and car keys. HA! Wtf? Is that what’s to become of us all?
I suppose I’ve learned a couple of things from this experience. The first one is that I pay my dues just like everyone else, and although I have no desire to linger in that locker room, I’ll continue to use the lockers when I work out. But I’ll still make it quick when I retrieve my bag as I don’t have any desire to get picked on by a toddler with car keys 😊LOL