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The YMCA on Park St has shut its doors for a week for maintenance and will reopen on Sept 8. Details of the closure and alternative arrangements for the week are found here. Registration and the dropoff of Extended Care forms may still be done at the Park St Y from today through Friday. (Separately, please note Montclair Township’s Essex swimming pool on Chestnut St is closed for the season. Mountainside and Nishuane pools are open for another week)
Reuters editor, food blogger, photographer, diva of the domestic arts More by Bernadette Baum
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With the crisp weather, I plan to do some real bicycling. I might also dust off the wii fitness upstairs, and swim if it ever gets hot enough!
Today is also the first day for signing up for fall classes at the Family Center, a.k.a. the Little Y.
I completed the Mittys’ registration online at 8:00 a.m.
Biking this weekend, probably around 125 miles over 2-3 days. Hundreds of pushups, crunches. Dozens of pullups, chinups. I’m in better shape now than when I was 25. Hoooah!
I love the Y, especially the elipticals and treamills. I do all my upper body work at home. I prefer calisthenics(sp?) over weights.
A few years ago, a 25 mile bike ride was a real workout. Now it’s just a snack. Bicycling is totally addicting. I can’t wait for my carbon road bike!!!!!!
I urge anyone who hasn’t started a regimine of physical exercise to get started. It will improve your life immeasurably.
After 9/11, I ceased all unnecessary physical activity. I was depressed and suffering from extreme anxiety and lost interest in many of my favorite pastimes. Being in NYC that day and experiencing the horror of this event, first hand, had a profoundly negative effect on my psyche. I suffered from PTS for quite some time and had recurring nightmares for a couple of years. It was a dark time for the mellonmeister, very dark. I became a true couch potato, gaining about 25 pounds of flab and after a couple of years had lost nearly all of my muscle tone. I couldn’t even do 5 pushups. It was pathetic, very sad.
About 3 years ago, somehow, I found the will to begin to climb out of the pit I had found myself in. Exercise was the key. I started with stair pushups. They take about 1/4 the strength as a regular pushup. Eventually I was able to do real pushups again. I joined the Y and started to swim and use the aerobic equipment and later the weight room. At 54 years old, It takes time to gain a repectable level of fitness, so I had to be patient. Eventually I really started to see results. I even get the occasional second glance from the ladies these days – something I hadn’t experienced for many years. I have to tell you It really feels good.
Why is it that on these robopoles I’m always looking for the “Other” key. They always make me feel like a square peg in a round Baristaville. Can’t you get rid of them and and just do the open thread?
Thank you for sharing your story. I just wanted to mention this link in case you might feel like contributing your personal account of 9/11: https://makehistory.national911memorial.org/
I find it very encouraging to read of how you managed to overcome that mental and physical block to exercise and hope many others will too.
Bernadette,
Thanks for the link. I’ve already written my account of the events of this day and perhaps I will share it with others via this link.
It started with me walking to work and passing Ladder Company 10, seeing the young firefighters congregated in front in their shorts, enjoying a spectacular September morning and the attention of the young ladies passing by. I thought, “what a fantastic job, to be young, fit, handsome and in service”. The irony of this moment still haunts me. I’m sure that some of these young men perished that day.
I started taking my running seriously soon after 9-11. I’m not sure if it was some sort of survivalist mentality, a way to burn off steam, or a combination of both. At any rate, it paid off and the YMCA on Park Street played a bit of a role in that. On days that I didn’t run, I worked out and got to meet some great people there. It was there that I also learned about the Montclair 10K. That was my first race ever, back in 1998. What a feeling of accomplishment to cross the finish line at my first 10K race! Little did I know that I had caught the racing bug and that would go on to complete my first marathon in 2003.
The mere mention of the date opens up the floodgates of emotion. At the time, I watched everything unfold on TV in London, four months pregnant, and the skies were astonishingly blue and clear there too. It feels right to remember and reflect on all those whose lives were snatched away that day, and everyone else for whom the world will never be the same. Please share your story!