Pumping Irony

For a couple of years when I was in my early 30's, I belonged to a gym. While most of the members focused on weight-lifting, I was there almost invariably to use the treadmill. (My maximum speed was 9.6 mph -- my heart and lungs could have supported a faster velocity, but whenever I attempted to break that 9.6 mph barrier, I would get a pain in my groin muscles.)

The entire gym was, aside from the locker rooms, one large rectangular room, containing all of the various types of apparatus. It was not a huge place. There were probably about 50 people there on a good night, mostly men if I recall correctly. There were several regulars, who were in very good shape, able to lift prodigious amounts of weight.

One of them was a man with jet black hair, in his thirties, quite short. But what he lacked in vertical stature, he more than made up for horizontally: the muscles of every area of his body protruded, almost cartoonishly.

On one particular evening, he was really putting an all-out effort into his exercises, working his thigh muscles, if I recall correctly. Such was the level of his exertion that at one point, he began, with every "rep", to use the bodybuilder's parlance, to grunt very loudly. A few turned heads from various people around the room.

But that was just the overture. A few minutes later, these grunts exploded into full-blown roars of effort. Arrgghh! the man bellowed, with each expansion of his rippling muscles. Now every single person in the entire gym stopped working whatever muscle group they happened to be developing at that moment. The usual cacophony of grunts and gasps, moans and groans, huffs and puffs, and clanging of metal, as people worked their abs, pecs, lats and delts, ground to a halt. All eyes in the room were fixated on this man. If science ever discovers a medical breakthrough whereby men are be able give birth, I'm fairly confident that the resultant spectacle will look and sound very much akin to how this man did at that moment, as his entire body flexed, heaved and bulged.

Argh! His face has now metamorphosed from beet red to a dark purple.

Arrrggghhh!!!!! The cords standing out in his neck are so thick and prominent that you could tie a boat to a dock with them.

Arrrrrrrggggggghhhhh!!!!!!!!!! You swear that any second now, he is going to launch himself into orbit from the sheer effort he is exerting.

Finally, he sets down the weights, lowers himself to the ground, and implodes. He is spent, drenched with sweat. He lies there motionless, completely exhausted, eyes popping, gasping, as his lungs greedily take in much needed oxygen.

There is an awkward silence throughout the room. Somehow, there is a collective intuitive understanding that for everyone to just return to their regular routines after this display would be unseemly. Nobody knows what to say or do, or how to break the tension.

But I do.

I walk over towards the man, and stop about a foot away from him. And then, shaking my head slowly, in a tone of disappointment, say to him:

You know, if you're not even gonna try...