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I shouldn’t be laughing but giggle anyhow. Nobody notices, I hope. I sit on the side, near a blood pressure machine and try to look sauve, worldly, but probably rouse only some curiosity. My fingers fly like the wind, writing what my roving eyes see.

They stop on a dime. A young woman is trying to sit on a huge green inflated ball while reaching as high as she can to get hold of two pulleys so she can stretch her arms, maybe develop muscles she thinks will make her more attractive. She can’t do it and falls off the ball, chases it and tries again.

A balding man to my right lies flat on his back on a large blue mat, a white towel around his neck. He turns over, bends one knee and wraps the other around the bent one like a snake. He holds that awkward position for about 3 minutes, that surely feel like 15 to him. Switch. With each turn, he sits up momentarily, re-arranges his too short shorts with legs wide enough so peepers who want to see what’s under them, if they so desire, can. I did not have the slightest interest to view his gonads or to think too long about his sopping shirt. The already perspired towel he used to dry the mat could not do much good. I blink and another acrobat plunks himself down on it.

This is amazing. Am I watching preparations for a circus freak show?Nobody gets paid. In fact, the price is high to contort oneself. Are they slimming down or opening their bodies for more assaults, back aches, leg cramps? The new man on the non-sterilized mat near me, possibly sending germs my way, does push ups, fast and numerous. .I lose count and interest after 15. Without a breather he switches to touching his toes, over and over, from a sitting position. If he were pregnant, he’d be in labor.

A menagerie of animals, sweaty, twisted, parade before me. I sit still while my fingers grasp my pen. Words fly across the lined pages. I see, I hear, but cannot understand why these people pay to work so hard. Why not go into construction, help build apartment houses, a new bridge, pave a road, be useful?

There is a man almost out of my sight who fascinates me. He must be 85 years old, maybe a few more. He stands, his legs slightly parted, slightly bent as he makes tiny, tiny soft jabs into the air. He couldn’t hurt a fly if that fly taunted, teased, annoyed him. There is no spirit, no strength, no oomph to his effort. He smiles, glances to see if any women are watching him, and does the Twist without twisting. Actually, he is a joy to watch. He has not yet resigned himself to an old age home. He is doing more than I do, will ever do.

The weird contraptions, pulleys, presses are in constant use. Skinny ladies, pregnant women, fat men sometimes wait in line to get to the equipment that may help them face themselves. Trainers hold legs tightly erect while the rest of his client sweats bullets. Big green, blue, silver balls, are rolled, sat on. I sit, I wait for my daughter to join me, rest, listen to what I have written while she built muscles she doesn’t need.

Here she comes, showered, ready for lunch. She isn’t interested, resents my attitude and I don’t blame her. If I weren’t her captured audience and we weren’t going shopping together, I’d be angry at her being angry at me. Maybe I’ll destroy what I saw, felt, not mention it to her ever again.

Fat chance!