chronicles of a wannabe gymmer

what is it about guys and gyms? this esoteric relationship that witnesses more love and hate twists than a saas-bahu serial courtesy e. kapoor?

i recently joined a gym. by recently i mean about 3 months ago. now typically, if you've seen me, i'm not quite the hulk hogan. but despite my slightly below average weight, i do like to describe myself as being somewhat athletic. while i may not have the right bulges, i do have the right lines and cuts which indicate potential for bulges. and this potential is exactly what i hoped to exploit upon signing up

right....so coming to this curious matter of guys and gyms. i see a lot of things when i go to the gym. not that i go very often. that's problem one. if i go two days in succession, i feel as if i've won the nobel prize or something. kudos to aman!! lets sit back and relax a day. or two. or three. who even thinks about the undoing of 2 days of backbreaking toil? not when there's xbox to be played, beer to be drunk, people to be met. that's all more important than keeping fit.

keeping fit. that's number two. i joined initially just to stay fit. thought i'd do cardios, keep my paunch reined in, develop some stamina. now here's the weird thing. there's something about a gym that makes you feel like you are capable of being a greek god. after a few days of cardio, i felt good about myself. i even went to the bathroom after one or two workouts to check myself out in the mirror. things were on track. yes!!! and then....you see the others. those hardcore gymmers, who come into the gym for about 2 hours a day, and do only weights. and you...you're trying so hard to put them down, saying they have no life and spend all their time sweating with other guys. that they have no brains, only brawn. sighhh...you fail to convince yourself. what can one do when next to him is a guy (call him X) lifting weights 4 times as heavy as this guy, whose biceps are twice as thick as one's body, and who looks like slapping bison dead with his right hand while skinning crocodiles with his left is his pastime hobby?

and yet, at the other end of the spectrum, you have what i will call the type 2 male. so round he tries to call himself aerodynamic. so hairy he says his skin is dark. and so sweaty, you have to wait after he's used a machine for it to dry. and he comes to the gym, this type two, wearing tight shorts (the sight of which makes my eyes bleed when he squats) and tiny tees that crawl up 8 inches when he stretches, revealing a forest of hair thick enough to camp in (ugh...what a thought!!!). and of course, he's bitten by the greek god syndrome, working out like it's his duty to reveal the pleasures of his self to the world.

so what is it that draws me to the gym? a typical person X, i'm always afraid, will start laughing when he sees the relatively puny weights i struggle along with. the average type 2 male is a burden on the eyes, his sweat is rancid enough to kill dead meat all over again, and his sweat (god have mercy) could pass for the black sea. so y do i go??

one answer could be females. but there's a flaw in this reasoning. the only females who come to a gym are the ones who need the gym. that is to say, those who look like beached walruses, but are in fact much bigger but lesser likely to breed. in the off chance that some slim attractive woman does turn up, hot figure and all, she drones like a bee drawn to the hive that is Mr X, he whose shadow could probably knock me over. so much for brain triumphing over brawn.

so here we are. wrong girls, huge guys, right girls going to huge guys, and huge guys. yet i still go, unfailingly, unwaveringly, unfalteringly, consistently, 2-3 days of our 7 day weeks. after dragging myself home tired from office. despite no visible effect on my physique. it really is a puzzle. go figure.....