Thank You --by Bryan F.

Like so often happened in my school days, I am just starting this essay that is due Monday, on Sunday morning. Yes, I was one of those students. I would proclaim to my critics, my Mom, that I worked better under pressure. This, of course, was and is not true. Back then it was just plain old procrastination and a desire to ride my bike rather than do some stupid homework. 

That is not, of course, the case now that I'm fifty years older and can do pretty much what I want with my time. I guess that's one of the reasons I accepted this opportunity, to write a blog, with as it turns out, six other truly beautiful and amazingly talented people. You all help me to continue to grow mentally and emotionally, even as I enter the Wednesday of my sixties. 

So my excuse for my late start is actually a good one. I've been working hard all week on two blog posts. One about the autumn in my first year of high school when I marched in the marching band at football games and parades and began to feel my own power as a person. Writing about that important time that comes when you transition from the child to the adult self just stalled and will need some more time for it to germinate into something readable, if it ever does. 

Because that first year of high school happened in the school year that began in the fall of 1969, I began to think about that year. I thought perhaps a homage to that messy, crazy, dangerous and amazing year might warrant a mention. That year that is now fifty years gone but refuses to be forgotten by anyone with any knowledge of our history. A year that was so full that it will not fit into a single post even with expert editing. It would be an injustice to gloss over such a historic time. I won't innumerate the events here, I'll save that for a year-end tribute. I began to work on it as a post for this week and realized that it would take more than a week to do it justice and a lot more research. I'm thinking that sometime nearer the end of the year I will pay tribute with two or three consecutive posts.

Because I have not really done anything here yet, other than making excuses for my unfocused week in writing, I need to leave you all with something more than my excuses. So here is what was a good and satisfactory week.

My brother and I managed to get to the gym all five of our workout days, Monday through Friday this last week. There is usually something that gets in the way like a dental appointment or a sore muscle. I also looked at our check-in's on the gym website and we both agreed we were missing way too many workouts, sometimes just because we didn't feel like going. We have recommitted to get each other there whenever it's possible and to let go of the excuses. Doctors' appointments and other important issues excepted.

I actually feel a little depressed when I miss a gym day. It's one of the very few opportunities I get to go out into the public. I have begun to notice the regulars at the gym and their routines. The fit men are also very enjoyable to watch. Yes, I'm a big old voyeur. I like men with small defined waists and well-developed legs, a super-fit look. Overly muscled bodies can look like hidden obesity to me. Yoga bodies are also nice.

I also get inspired by the not so fit folks. Like myself, most that are working out are not going to make it on to Men's or Women's Health magazine covers. We're just there trying to get healthy or to reverse a medical situation and some to meet and make new friends. There is one guy that stands out and inspires me. He is small and fragile-looking, very thin and not that old either. He pulls around a small oxygen tank to workout on the weight machines. I've never seen him in aerobic equipment, which makes sense. He is my inspiration. 

There are some folks that are obese or morbidly obese that get on the treadmills or ellipticals and just kick ass with their three hundred plus pound bodies. Fighting to reverse that which no longer serves them. I lost forty-five pounds before I started going to the gym in 2017. Depression is one way but not highly recommended. 

I also got to watch a gym guy take apart and put together a treadmill that was right in front of the

recumbent bike I was working out on during my Friday workout. It was very interesting. My brother and I speculated that this repair may have been the result of one of the guys that I was just talking about. They had to replace the board that was deeply worn with the black paint missing in spots. It was all very interesting, but the thing is there is another machine that is out of order right now as well. Coincidently and this is not making light of folks suffering from obesity but both machines had been used by a new guy that kind of stands out because he's closer to the six hundred pound range. We don't have anyone else at the gym in that weight range and my brother and I were speculating as to whether there was a correlation between his use the previous days and the breakdowns. Don't get me wrong, I'm blown away that he's doing something. He's not very old maybe early thirties and if he stays the course may see another decade and I applaud him. My autistic detective mind can't help but wonder what the load capacity is on those LifeFitness treadmills is, though. 

I guess you can see that I get a lot more than fitness from the gym including the friendship with my brother that has been enhanced by the experience. My encouragement and his better focus has caused him to grow healthier and lower substantially his blood sugar. He's had a rough go of it the last eleven years when he nearly lost his life after a serious infection following a surgery at the Veteran Hospital. He has always been the kind one that you don't want to cross. No, I won't attempt to explain that. Those that know, know.  In a way we kids, the four of us, took care of each other from a very early age. I am so grateful I have this time when I get to see him five times a week and cook him egg tacos for breakfast. He never tires of them and says they taste better every time. My little brother takes care of me too. 

The other way that I manage to sustain my sanity is by way of my dear sweet girls, Pheobe and Lucy. Lucy is the gentlest cat I've ever met and she was not so when I first got her as a kitten. She was a monster, but one day she found her way into the heating ducts under the mobile home and was trapped there most of the day. She is an indoor cat. She was still young but not still kitten size and was apparently not fitting through the ducts very well. I'm guessing there was a broken duct she made her way into after her escape from inside the house. There is a place she can push the skirting in by the rear deck stairs and likely made her way under the house there. Anyway, about nine o'clock that evening I was just crying and mourning the fact that I'd never see her again when I heard a very weak meow from somewhere around the laundry room. I got the heat vent off and there she was. She had been working her way through and was too big for the space so completely exhausted. She was limp in my arms and looked up at me with an appreciation that she still has in her eyes some six years later. She is the only cat I have ever met that will mind me, come when I call and never sinks her claws into my flesh, at least not on purpose.

Pheobe is my toy min-pin. She is super gentle for her breed and was initially acquired to replace the dog my Mom was mourning when she came to live with me so I could be her full-time caregiver. She loves her walks and the Greenie Blueberry treat she gets afterward. She snuggles me and tries to move my hand from the computer keyboard so I can pet her. She is very fierce when she first meets another dog on our walks but otherwise a little lover. They both, Lucy and Phoebe keep me sane in my very limited world. 

My world is limited by my circumstances. I don't go to movies, concerts or nightclubs, clubs or meeting. But right now my brother, the gym, my fur kids and yes, my writing group provides me the mental stimulation and social contact that keeps me sane. Thank you all.

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