Fitness Friends: Could This Be Community?
Amy Boucher Pye
April 1, 1999
Saturday mornings were sacrosanct; they were for 9:30 aerobics and nothing else. We would gather for a killer hour and a half, jumping and bouncing to "Le Freak" and "Stayin' Alive." Glutes and abs adequately antagonized, we then burned our mouth muscles by the coffeepot. Could toning and triceps constitute community? Life at my fitness club—was this at all communal? Robert Bellah (Habits of the Heart) would probably call it a lifestyle enclave: a group of people who come together through a shared feature of private life, celebrating the narcissism of similarity. Unlike a community, those in an enclave are not interdependent, do not act together politically, and do not share a history. So why do I miss these women so deeply? Our imperfect bodies brought us together. We descended on the local fitness club to kickstart our cardiovascular systems and cajole our calves. Remove the sagging bags, we cried, and become young again. Wrinkles are out; smooth skin is in. Flab and fat have passed away; bodies are now lean and lithe. If we can't have it all, we assumed, maybe at least we can control all of our body. And if we look good on the outside, surely we must be okay inside. Being the youngest in my group by 10 to 20 years, I heard the cries against aging and witnessed the lasers, liposuctions, and lifts. A shot of collagen here; a nip and tuck there; the sucking of fat from an already size six. I was both fascinated and repelled. My own mirror was starting to reflect tiny lines around my eyes. When had those furrows in my brow sprouted? What might a couple more decades' damage make of me? Would I be strong enough to be content to grow old with grace and wrinkles? I hoped so, but also resolved to don a hat and apply sunscreen. Gossip ...
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