I Got Moves Like Jagger

If Jagger had vertigo and busted knee caps...

“Let’s do Body Jam”, they said. “It’ll be FUN”, they said. “It’s EASY”, they said. They are apparently decent dancers…and dirty rotten liars.

We walked into the class and I quickly found my spot in the back of the room.

In walks bounces this tiny ball of cuteness.

I hate her.

I’m pretty sure her body fat is in the negative numbers.

I hate her.

Her half-shirt revealed a belly that I’m guessing is probably harder than my forehead. 

I hate her. 

She walks bounces along flashing a smile and chatting with everyone in the room.

I want to hate her, but she’s not doing anything wrong other than being cute.  I decided that in an effort to compromise with myself, I’d hate her from the chin down. My inner child sneaks in the observation that Ball of Cuteness only has ONE chin. I tell her to shut up.

Let’s get this party started…

Enter Obi-Wan! Obi-Wan looked like Fitness Barbie. She was decked out in pink with a high pony tail and she was giving off more energy than the sun! When Obi-Wan turned around, I noticed PINK written across her backside. I’m pretty sure if I put on a pair of those pants at this point, ‘PINK’ would only cover a very small portion of the canvas that is currently my a$$. Nope, ‘PINK’ would not do the trick. Mine would have to say COTTON CANDY or…

HOT MAGENTA

I decided at that moment that I WILL wear pink on my butt at least once before I am 40. Pink WILL cover my butt nicely. It won't be all stretched out or begging for back up letters. GOAL SET.

Obi-Wan took the stage. Ball of Cuteness joined her. There was a line of ladies in the front row who knew exactly what they were doing. We’ll call them the Solid Gold Dancers. (Anyone remember that show?) 

The music started...

Side to side...sway, step - not bad!

COMBO!

Wait, WHAT?

It was not pretty.

My arms and legs are NOT on the same operating system. I’d get the legs down then they’d add some arm combo. Solid Gold dancers were on it, I was just flailing around. I looked like I was drowning on dry land. 

Every time I thought I had it, sneaky Obi-Wan would add another move. She’d ask us if we wanted to add it first, but she was just pretending to care about my feelings to cover the fact that she was a fitness predator. I kept saying NO. No means NO to most people.

My no meant NOTHING to Obi-Wan!

I felt so violated by her fitness. To make matters worse, she and the BOC (ball of cuteness) were smiling the whole time! Do you know how hard it is to watch someone smile when they make you feel like you are going to die a painful, awkward, uncoordinated death?

They added a plies; I plowed. They added some strange arm-led spinny thingy dingy; I looked like one of those windup toys that has to run into something before it turns. There was one kind soul in the back who took pity on me. God love her, she tried to help me get it right. She even acted humble like she wasn’t nailing it. She was – she rocked it – but she wasn’t judging me for not. She was encouraging me to stick with it even after I almost poked her in the eye. She was like my Body Jam BF.

Obi-Wan kept telling us how sexy we looked. Ba ha ha ha. Don’t get me wrong – She, along with the BOC and the Solid Gold Dancers all looked fabulous. Maybe she couldn’t see us jiggling about in the back of the room. 

But she must have seen us because whenever I was feeling like I needed to stop, she’d throw out something encouraging like, “Don’t quit!”, “You’re changing your body!” and “You can have ice cream if you finish!” (Just kidding on that last one…she didn’t really say that) It is amazing how much I love these instructors the minute they say we are finished, after loathing them for the prior hour.

Let me throw in this little advertisement - if any of you are looking for some workout mojo, slide by the Fitness Rave. Their instructors will make you hate them and love them at the same time. They work your body but speak to your heart. The music choices are great and it is pretty cool that the instructors take each other’s classes. I am griping and complaining but it is all in fun. The bottom line is that I keep going back, which says A LOT. Who knows?  I've been listening to my NO for far too long - maybe if I stop listening to my 'NO' like Obi-Wan, I'll be a Solid Gold Dancer one day too!

This journey I have started is NOT easy, but I love every minute of it. I deserve to be healthy and I won’t accept anything less from myself. It’s amazing what happens when you stop beating yourself up for not being thin and decide that you are worthy of being fit. 

Stay tuned…

*Just to clarify - I don't think it would be humanly possible to hate either of these women, unless you are jealous of them, which I totally am. :p

Body Jam take two – they took out the tootsie roll – I was so glad because my tootsie does NOT roll!

My apologies - apparently it's the BUTTERFLY, NOT the tootsie roll.  My butter doesn't fly any more than my tootsie rolls, but I want to make sure I use the proper 90's dance lingo. :)

xoxo