When I was a junior high kid, the raciest reading material was found in a cheap pulp magazine called TRUE CONFESSONS. There were also pulp publications called True Detective, True Love, True Crime, et.al. They were all like forbidden fruit—we wanted to read them so badly. Every now and then, one of the girls would get their hands on one and the rest of us waited to read it—like buzzards lined up on dead limbs of trees overlooking a decaying carcass in the desert. The stories in the magazines were sort of like decaying carcasses too, but….we had to read them. Oh so naughty! So daring! So out of our league!!
Today I have True Confessions of my own to make: that of being a mixed up, ding-batt-ish flounder-er for most of the morning. It is such a gorgeous early spring day. The sun is blazing, the meltwater is running fast and furiously over the streets, and here on the Buffalo Bluff the streams are pouring toward the river down below. It is glorious.
I went to the community center to excercise today…to actually attend a class called "Silver Sneakers". I took my good friend with me and both of us were raring to go. We got there early and I showed her around the place…all the great features of a complete and marvelous facility that draws so many people of all ages to get in shape in so many possible ways. We arrived in the spacious room for the Silver Sneakers class but were advised to have a bottle of drinking water under our chairs, so we went in search of the Dasani machine by the walking track. Bottles of water gotten, we went to open the door to the excercise room, and (I was in the lead) opened a door…….that showed us the great outdoors. It also had a fire escape linked to it and no sooner did it open than a very LOUD alarm went off and kept going off. Two gentlement who were excercising on some nearby weight machines began to laugh heartily when I said, "How do you turn it off?" "You don’t." the laughed back. My friend was already fleeing the scene,eager no to be associated with me at that moment…. back through the REAL door to the excercise room and I fled too. I am afraid the Fire Dept. had to come to answer the call I set off. I sat down on my chair and tried to look like nothing had happened. I did not get arrested, at least.
We did over 45 minutes of very good excercises designed for older people. After chatting with the instructor for several minutes and turning in our excercise balls, our stretchy ropes, and our hand weights, we headed downstairs to the snack shop where we chatted more with some ladies we knew from our community. Then off to the parking lot to get in my vehicle, make a stop at the library, and then check out a really nice Oriental Buffet place that was highly recommended to us. I made a beeline for the silvery colored van I drive and put the key in the lock to open the doors. I could not get the key to go in fully so I went to the other door and repeated the process. Suddenly I noticed the word "Plymouth" on the side of the silvery van and I shrieked, "It’s the wrong car!" to my friend who was waiting patiently to get in it. I galloped off in search of MY silvery Previa van while my poor friend was being disabled by her hysterical laughter. Both of us had a lot of water at the class so we were both in pretty bad shape to find a "ladies room". This led to more hysterical laughter and a lot of leg-crossing. I finally found my real van and opened it up so we could drive to the Buffet. It was sensational, just as the recommenders had said it would be. As we left, I looked in the back seat, and sheepishly told my companion we would have to backtrack to the town library since I had totally forgotten (in the van panic) to go there before we left the main part of town. Back we go, still weak from laughter and full of too much delicious Oriental food. The library books and films got returned but in the process of returning them, I parked temporarily in the lot, blocking one of the patrons who wanted to get out of a parking space. More gazelle-like galloping to get my car out of the way and we finally headed home. Senior citizens, especially female senior citizens , are just not meant to run around wildly in parking lots. I had way more excercise than what I got at the Silver Sneakers class. But we got going in the right direction and are back home now.
Both of us need naps badly. So I am off to the recliner with my wonderful new book I am reading. I hope all the ding-battishness has disappeared after I wake up from a good nap. Yawn!
