And the Universe Speaks...

Mambo! Everybody go Mambo!! Or, in the case of my morning today... Zumba! Everybody do Zumba!!

I took a Zumba class this morning with my friend Goldie. We went to the Y where she has been working out. Key words in that prior sentence: "she has been working out." As for me? Well I haven't "worked out" since sometime in mid 2004. It was a humbling experience. My insightful observations:

• I am out of shape (you can file that one under "no shit sherlock" or "Thank you Captain Obvious").
• When your friend says that you don't need to take a water bottle with you. Ignore her. About 20 minutes in to the class, I was pulling my tongue off the roof of my mouth in tempo with the music. As luck would have it there was a water fountain in the room. That was the good news. The bad news was there was sign above it that said "No Spitting." People don't just put signs over stuff for no good reason. I bent down to suck in the life sustaining liquid while saying a silent prayer that there would be no big green loogey in there to greet me. I kept my eyes closed just in case. What you can't see won't hurt you. Especially when you have no moisture in your mouth.
• More than half of the class was older than 60. I was chest-clutching and they were zumba-ing with aplomb. Humbling. The ultimate check-mate from the universe indicating that I need to get up off my ass more.
• One woman who was zumba-ing beside me was not exactly rocking the moves - she and I were about on the same zumba-scale. She was, however, easily 80 years old. I decided to be all zen with it - it was my first class after all and for all I knew she'd been coming to Zumba every day for the past decade. Yup, I was all zen...until the class was over. My 80 year old fellow zumba-er slowly walked over to the side of gym to grab her stuff AND her cane. The balloon holding my self-esteem deflated with a deafening hssssssss. Again, Universe, thanks for that message.
• I gotta get me some "real" workout shoes. The pseudo-10-year-old-chucks are not going to cut it. I think I pulled an arch or a toe or something. Who knew that all those ads about having the right shoe were right? I thought they were just trying to get you to buy stuff.
• I have made a personal vow to stop being such a harsh unrelenting critic of all those folks on Dancing with the Stars. I have been known to make some biting and debasing comments about them there stars and their dance moves. Honestly? How friggin hard can that Quick Step be? Turns out that's it's hard. Like super-super-even-if-you-are-semi-coordinated-hard. I would like to especially direct my apologies to Kate for this season. She did look like a robot. But after having to seamlessly integrate feet and arms with a side to side buttocks pumping move this morning...well, color me contrite. I get it. The casual observer may have thought I was having some kind of slow-motion grand mal seizure rather than trying to replicate the sensual rhythmic zumba moves being exhibited by the instructor.
• I need a nap. And shoes. But I need the nap first....