I exercise. In a gym. When you do that regularly you eventually get to know other people because they do the same, at the same time, on the same machines. I observed one fellow in particular. An over-achiever if there ever was one. Ten sets of ten was nothing to him. He did twenty sets. If twenty pounds was heavy to me he set it at forty. And he was not all that young. Just strong and determined.
By coincidence I met him one day at the supermarket. I mean, I saw him. I did not speak to him. I noticed that he was looking at a large carton of beer, 24 bottles, I think. It must have weighed at least twenty-five pounds or so. He did not even attempt to pull it off the bottom shelf, let alone lift it. He asked for help and had the young man lift it and carry it to his car. We are talking about the same “weak old man” who just earlier had been lifting forty pound weights over his head twenty times in a row. Absurd, no?
Twice a week he devoted himself to what must have amounted to a marathon: he worked that treadmill to death. Not just quietly and deliberate but with a vengeance, making the whole floor thump and shake under his heavy running steps, so loud and obvious that other exercisers would look up to see where that noise was coming from. His T-shirt soaked in perspiration he would keep this up for a good hour sometimes, never mind that twenty minutes was the “official” time limit. Schwarzenegger squared.
He must live in my neighborhood for I saw him again recently on my way to the supermarket. I recognized his car. He was cruising the parking lot, apparently hunting for an available slot. There really was no need to hunt. There were a lot of free places but not in the first row, of course. He slowed down in front of a spot about five rows to the back but then saw some backup lights coming on farther down. He trundled on expectantly but it was a false alarm. The driver of that car was merely straightening out her position between the lines, then turned off the ignition and got out. So my friend was still not parked. He turned into the next aisle and slowly rolled past eight empty spaces at the back of the lot, obviously still looking for something closer to the store entrance. On his next pass he spotted a space at the very front, in the number one position. He turned on his blinker but another car coming from the left beat him to it. Honking his horn angrily – after all, he had considered that space to be his – he had to turn into the next aisle again where he, reluctantly I suppose, settled for a space in the number two location, the second from the front.
Behold, then, Mister Marathon of the morning knocking himself out to avoid walking an extra three yards or so. It must be an inborn competitive spirit that compels people, a sort of subconscious Trumpian fear of being a loser. Ironic, actually. Nay, Byronic rather. “Fools are my theme, let satire be my song”, Lord Byron wrote.
(c) by Herbert H. Hoffman