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2000-06-16

I'd gotten out of the habit of going to the Y. It was hard enough when I started this job, 15 miles from the town where I live, where I used to work, where the Y is. At my old job, I'd go the Y at lunch or on my way home. With this job, lunch is out of the question and the extra commute puts me there at a later (busier) hour. But I still managed to get there twice a week until B started working for the man in April.

Since then, I've been eager to get home to the dogs, who are now alone all day except for ten minutes at lunch when B lets them out. I've been eager to get home and enjoy having the house to myself for the hour and a half before B arrives (something that almost never happened when he worked at home).

It's not that I haven't been exercising. I use the Y mostly for weights, getting my aerobic action in at home on the non-motorized WalkFit 5000 treadmill. And I even picked up some elastic resistance bands that I've been using once in a while. But it's not the same as the weights at the Y. Besides, I like the Y. And it's been killing me to see that fee drafted from my checking account every month for nothing.

Yesterday I decided was it. I was going to Y after work no matter what. I packed my gym bag in the morning. I'd seen my padlock in the little change-holder cubby of my car. As I left work, it occurred to me that it had been a while since I'd used the lock. So long, in fact, that I'd forgotten the combination!

At my Y, leaving anything of value in an unlocked locker is not an option. I knew I could lock everything but my little wallet-keyring combo in the car and carry the wallet-keyring combo with me as I worked out, but I hate doing that. It's very distracting and I'm always afraid people will think I suspect them of criminal intent if I move it closer to me when they approach.

So I started trying different combinations. As I was driving on the highway at 65 miles an hour. I thought about how stupid I'd feel if I got into an accident because I was fiddling with a combination lock. I wondered if anyone else had ever gotten into an accident because they were fiddling with a combination lock. I tried dozens of variations on the theme I thought I remembered. I tried to put myself into a trance and turn off my brain and let my fingers remember for me. (You know, body memory.) I was near giving up when I tried something quite different. And it worked! I grabbed a pen and wrote it on the fleshy base of my thumb.

And the time at the gym was great. My town really clears out in the summer, and the place was nicely uncrowded. When I got home I changed into a bathing suit and joined B in the pool. I lay on the raft and he walked around the bottom of the pool on his hands lizard-like (remember, it's two feet deep). We talked about our days, about a couple we know who have fallen on very hard times. Health problems, financial problems, one of them is on the verge of leaving problems. We talked about how lucky we are.

Then we got out of the pool. Our teeth chattered as we tried to share one towel. He lit charcoal and I walked the dogs. Then he grilled chicken breasts and I made a salad.

Life is good.

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