Gymnation

January is a time of resolutions and new beginnings and starting overs. In contrast, February is a time of trying to make those resolutions and beginnings and starting overs actually stick. But what of March? In our youth, March was the month of spring break. In our Chicago adulthood, it is a month much like any other winter one—cold, wet, and not even remotely springy.

Tired of long, dark wintery days spent hunched over computers at JBB World HQ and convinced they were becoming old and shrunken before their time, Trusty Editors Croftie and Oline roused themselves to action and did what every impoverished post-collegiate, pre-professional twenty-something would do— they joined a gym.

And because Trusty Editors who join gyms are supposed to share their sufferings and small personal victories with the world, that is precisely what they’re going to do.

“Ladies, Saddle your Ponies”
In Which Our Trusty Editors Find Their Dancing Queen


Remember when you were a twelve-year-old girl and there was that completely unattainable, unspeakably gorgeous guy who gave you the flutters every time he passed by in the school hallway? The guy you would gaze at in unadulterated pre-teen lust from across the room. The guy who would occasionally deign to speak to you, an action so profound, so sacred, that you would be reduced to an hour of giggles and gasps and sighs of “HE spoke TO ME!” and then frantically record every detail of the encounter in your journal.

Now that they are post-collegiate, pre-professional twenty-somethings, Trusty Editors Croftie and Oline were quite sure their twelve-year-old girl days had passed. They were quite sure they could no longer flutter as they once did. So it was with elation that, upon doing something so grown up as joining a gym, they realized they were in the wrong. Flutter they can. Flutter they do.

His name is Brantley. Croftie and Oline are in love.

Brantley teaches step class at the Trusty Editors’ gym every Tuesday afternoon. He is beautiful and he is largely the reason that the Trusty Editors have pursued their gymning with such vigor. They may punk out on other days of the week, but never ever Tuesday.

The Trusty Editors have uncovered certain truths about their beloved:

1) He is a Southern boy.
2) “Dancing Queen” is his theme song.
3) He has a bit of a complex about his obliques.
4) He is performing in some theatrical that involves dancing shirtless.
5) He is beautiful.

Like all obsessive twelve-year-old girls, Croftie and Oline have burned each Brantley encounter into their brains, imbuing them with far more meaning than they should rightfully hold.

There was the time Brantley shook Croftie’s hand (though, in retrospect, Croftie feels that perhaps he was making an effete gesture she overeagerly misinterpreted as the instigation of a handshake). The time Brantley squeezed Oline’s arm and said, Good job today! The time Brantley soulfully caressed Croftie’s rosy cheek. The time Brantley caught Oline singing “Proud Mary” in the midst of freeze-knees and shouted, You go, girl!

Croftie and Oline are quite certain that their dancing queen is unattainable. But that flutter of twelve-year-old girl hope is a wily vixen. It makes the workday bearable. It keeps them going back. To see Brantley. Sigh.