Oh, the drama!

I have been teaching fitness for nearly 15 years now.  Every gym I’ve ever worked at has a dazzling cast of characters.  It rivals a soap opera.   And there’s so much behind-the-scenes dirt going on … it’s enough to make your leg warmers curl.

I teach four, maybe five, classes a week at several different gyms.  I manage to always keep my nose clean.  And my leg warmers too.  But since I’m up in front of 40-50 different people in each class, there’s always a select few who view me as their therapist-counselor-mental health specialist.

Take Penny, for example.  (Name changed to protect the guilty.)  Penny was a regular in my class.  She’d always come in late, make a scene and act huffy if someone was in “her spot”.  On several occasions, I suggested getting to class a bit earlier.  She looked at me like I had three heads.  One day Penny poked her head in class exactly thirty seconds before I started teaching and announced, “Michael, can’t make it to class today.  I’ve got a SCORCHING yeast infection.”  (No, I’m not kidding.)  The entire class went silent and looked at me for solace.  Unfortunately, I was wearing my Janet Jackson-headset microphone at the time, so even the slightest inhale or exhale could be heard.  I looked at Penny and said, “Good luck with that, dear.  Maybe you could throw some raisins down there and make a scone?”

The class roared.  (Well, what else was I supposed to say?  I mean, really …)

There was another gal in class … an older lady with eggplant-colored hair.  It was not a color you’d normally find on someone’s head … let alone in nature.  She was a spitfire.   (Uh, that’s not her in the picture.) She’d pick on me as much as I’d pick on her.  We affectionately gave her the nickname “Grandma Funk”, since she’d always try to sing along with the songs even though she had nary a clue what the lyrics were.  Grandma Funk would lift the least amount of weight possible and do maybe half the requisite reps.  I never saw her break a sweat.   Then Grandma Funk fell off the face of the earth.  There were occasional Grandma Funk sightings, at the mall, dancing at a club or, of course, getting her hair done.  We made a little map in the fitness studio with push-pins for Grandma Funk sightings.  She was everywhere, except for my class.  I still wonder what happened to her.

My single favorite story of all time, and this one is classic, came from my early years in the fitness field.  A portly woman hovered outside my class for two weeks peering in the windows, but refusing to come in.  She finally managed enough gumption to join my class one day.  And started complaining almost immediately.  “It’s too hot in here!” she groused.  “The music is too loud,” she whined.  “I’m having trouble following along,” she protested.  I kept my cool through a majority of class because I’ve had people complain before and remained unfazed.  But this woman, in her purple velour tracksuit, was relentless.  “My shoulder hurts!  You’re going too fast!  The music is STILL too loud!”

My students were started to get agitated at this woman’s constant barrage of insults.  Finally, the class came to a close and as we were cooling down, the woman bee-lined up to me and barked, “I don’t care for you OR your teaching style.”

I then unleashed a torrent of all holy hell that is still probably floating in outer space to this day.  “You know what I don’t care for?  I don’t care for your attitude.  I don’t care for your purple velour tracksuit.   You look like a manatee that’s been forced on land.  Furthermore, I couldn’t care less what you have to say about me, my teaching style, my class or my music.  Get out of my class, Barney, and don’t EVER come back.”

And as she stomped out the door I threw in an extra, “I MEAN IT!” just to add gasoline to an already incendiary situation.

The owner of the gym was gone for a few days, so when she got back the gym was BUZZING with the story, one that had taken on a life of its own.  “So I heard you beat some woman to death with a barbell?” the owner quizzed.  “Lemme ask, was it the woman in the purple tracksuit?”

“Yepper,” I replied.

“Oh, I told her weeks ago to stop harassing the instructors.  You were obviously the last on her list.  Congrats,” she said.  “And I heard the manatee line.  Classic!  I’m giving you a raise.”

And that, my dear readers, is why I still work in the fitness industry.