cancelling the gym membership

I've got my hands in too many pots lately. My blog for the newspaper has received some attention; I was made a "featured blogger" and so far three of my pieces have found their way to the print edition of Your Hub, out on Thursdays. The editors hack the work to death, of course, since they have to in order to make the words fit (damned column inches!) but I accept their edits in exchange for the exposure. Mostly I write about my 'hood here in Denver, but occasionally I make forays out into other subjects, like race relations and local politics.

Today is a banner day, however. Today I am cancelling my gym membership. It's time. No longer can I afford to pay $70 a month for use of a gym I do not use more than 5x in that month, nor can I keep my personal locker in the Gold Club locker room, where no one is ever in there and I can walk around naked to my heart's content and I can get free lotion and sanitary products and Q-tips...and iron my clothes while watching t.v. It was fun while it lasted but it's time to wrench this security blanket from myself, like Linus releasing his tattered scrap of blue, and find another way.

Little by little, we've been clearing the basement. This past weekend we hauled all of our old electronic equipment to a (responsible) e-recycling center. We've cleared out three huge old boxes that we'd been storing for a friend for 8 (yes 8) years, and S. is working on plans for an enclosed cabinet where we can keep towels and washclothes and sheets...as it is, they're on open shelving by the washer and dryer, and after awhile, you have to wash them all over again because they get dusty and grimy. S. wants a recumbant bike; I want an elliptical. In the meantime, we're clearing out a space for our exercise ball and weights; I'm going to invest in some interlocking mats, kinda like fatigue mats in a restaurant kitchen, so we can gae a soft surface for stretching and the like. I'd also like to create a little meditation/yoga space down there, complete with a simple altar. If I can manage just 10 minutes a day of quiet contemplation, I think I'll be more capable of continuing my lifelong quest for true BALANCE.

So right now, right this second, I'm getting up and walking over to the gym. I've needed to do this for months, but kept putting it off, thinking "no, I'll go..." but I don't think that's where I am meant to be. Yoga, walking, hiking, biking, gardening...getting back with my trainer in her new studio...moving my body in new ways. That is what I need right now. I've got the momentum and S. and I are staying the WW course together. She's really working the program, and it's hard as hell for her, as she's concurrently dealing with body issues as they come up. I could not be more supportive of her, or more proud, though I wish there was another word for "proud"--it's not a maternal pride that I feel, or one laced with condescension, but rather this kind of awe at the hard work she's doing, and a newfound respect for her as a person who is continually changing and growing and trusting herself enough to risk...not falling back on the same patterns, not blaming it on not smoking, or genes, or depression. She's just taking it all one step at a time, and I've got her back and she's got mine. Forever.

But today, for me, it's about letting go of that security blanket. I'm posting this, and then I'm going to the gym. Without my gym bag.