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I get that I have to do it forever. I do.
I get that it’s not like, I work out for a few months and then I’m done, and I look better and it’s all over and yay! let’s go shopping! I have totally accepted that I have to work out for the rest of my life if I want to look better and I’m OK with that. I’ve even accepted that I will never look the way I want if I don’t eat diet food. I remain skeptical of my ability to do this with any kind of reliability, despite my intense desire to do it, but I accept it as a reality for me, I really do.
I also accept that this is the stupidest of stupid things to be concerned with, and hate that I care (so much) about this, or that it bothers me (so much). But nevertheless, here we are. I live in Los Angeles, and we have reached that point in the year where it’s so freaking hot that everybody is wearing tank tops and this is what my arms look like.
Well, Hello there, Betty!
Uggh. Six months with Travis for this?
UPDATE: Here is just the *last* part of a typical workout with Travis, not even the hardest part. This is why I am frustrated.
Periodically, Mr. Right-Click will get a bee in his bonnet about how I don’t have any friends.
I do have friends. In theory.
But not you know, local, close real life, in-person people that I really want to hang out with most of the time. As I write that, I’m really hoping that there’s not somebody I’m going to alienate and there probably is.
It’s like that Seinfeld episode where Jerry says, “I already have three friends — I cannot handle any more!” That’s me. I cannot handle any more than that.
Or like when somebody says something racist and they try to prove that they’re not really racist by saying that some of their best friends are black? I’m like that with people. Some of my best friends are people. Really. I mean it.
++++++++
When I was younger, I was kind of one of the smart kids, I guess, but I didn’t completely fit in with them, either, mostly because I did not let myself. I have never really been comfortable with the concept of fitting in. Kind of a “Wouldn’t be a member of any club that would have me,” kind of thing.
But in any case, the smarter kids were more accepting of me. Most of them did not seem to have a problem with me, and they were my friends. As it happened, the group of kids I went through school with had a large group of smart kids, so some of the smart kids were also cool kids. Which doesn’t always happen, you know. So this was kind of weird. Because I was kind of not fitting in with the smart kids and not fitting in with the smart kids who were also cool kids at the same time.
My friend R and I always referred to the cool kids as “Bops.” It was “the Bops” this and “the Bops” that. There was a “Bop” party somewhere on the East side. We could go but who knew whether the Bops would want us there. All of the Bops are wearing those stupid jelly sandals again, did you see this?
Well, anyway, part of the smart kids were mixed in with Bops in my year, and this kind of mixed things up. And by the end of my Senior year, I found myself going to parties with Bops and smart kids, and equally not fitting in and fitting in with both groups, equally confused and identifying with each, equally amused and annoyed by each, finding fodder and infuriated by each. By the end of the year I was almost a Bop by Default, much to my chagrin. It was weird. I would have Bop friends and Smart friends, and some would talk to me in some contexts but not others.
Life is weird. It goes in cycles. People are weird. Sometimes they both make me want to punch things. Other times they make me want to hug things. Now that I’m older I have to try to remember the times that have come before and just laugh.
++++++++
I’ve been working out with Travis for several months now and occasionally, to better pass the time whilst torturing me with a round of Steppers! he will regale me with tales from life as a sort of single 22-year-old male in Los Angeles. I say sort-of single because technically Travis has a girlfriend, but you know how 22-year-olds are.
I have lived in or around Los Angeles my entire life, but never have I heard of Malibu referred to as “The ‘Bu” until Travis told me about going there a few weeks ago with a friend and his girlfriend, and seeing some “exceptionally well maintained cougars” to whom he yelled out something wildly inappropriate, as they crossed an intersection, after imbibing a few too many beers at a Mexican restaurant.
To clarify, I made a point of asking Travis if his girlfriend had been in the car at the time that he said these things to these “cougars.” After he confirmed this, I then asked for his girlfriend’s phone number, so that she and I could have a little “talk,” as well as the approximate ages of said “cougars,” just so that I know, for future reference, what passes for a cougar these days, in case it should ever come up.
Say what you will, but there is a certain wisdom in the simplicity of the 22-year-old male. It is not unlike that mentality I myself had in my mid-twenties, when I thought I just needed to find an investment banker to marry and all of my problems would be solved. Some days, Travis’ tongue-in-cheek life plan includes trolling The ‘Bu for a wealthy cougar to take care of him. On those days, we discuss how I can write about this on my blog and spin it without alienating all of my readers for being totally antifeminist. Other days, we discuss making a workout video for Travis’ “army of totally shredded housemoms.”
Life takes you strange places. Sometimes you don’t realize it until you’re discussing a spinoff series of CougarTown blog posts with a 22 year old personal trainer in between rounds of sumo squats.
Westside Rentals Guy started out as just your average sign-twirler on 11th & Wilshire in Santa Monica, directly adjacent to Westside Rentals, the apartment-locating service that employed him. When we first heard of Westside Rentals Guy, Mr. Right-Click and I weren’t married yet, and were living in sin just down the street from the street corner on which Westside Rentals Guy had set up shop. Except he wasn’t Westside Rentals guy as such yet, either, he was just a guy making $15 or so an hour to twirl a sign and get people to go into Westside Rentals. But it was clear pretty fast that Westside Rentals Guy was destined for more than just an average sign-twirling gig. Watching him in the early days was kind of like if you were to go to a youth basketball game in Cleveland in the nineties, and there’s one kid who is like a man among boys, already slam-dunking at age 8, and you’re like, “Who’s that guy?” and they’re like, “That’s little LeBron James.”
Except, you know, we’re talking about sign-twirlers here.
Sign-twirlers have a lot of range in ability. In one afternoon driving the streets of LA, you might see a guy wearing headphones and a hoodie, holding his sign for discounted linens like it’s a dirty diaper, doing his best to look away from oncoming traffic and with an expression like he wishes there was some way to just melt into the storefront behind him. Those guys get paid a little less than the guy who knows how to throw his arrow-shaped sign up into the air so that it will land with the arrow pointing in the exact direction of the condos that are about to go into foreclosure. It’s a burgeoning trade, lots of room for growth, sign-twirling. But I’m not going to lie to you, it’s hard work.
Even among gifted sign-twirlers, Westside Rentals Guy stood out, though. For one thing, he had the energy level of a hyperactive toddler who forgot to take his Ritalin. Westside Rentals guy would jump around and dance on his corner for hours at a time. Like four or five hours at a time, he would do this, pumping the sign up in the air and punching his other fist like he went to a rave sometime in the late nineties and never woke up from the X-high. Eventually he added a harness onto the sign so that he could dance with it attached to his arm, and not actually have to hold the thing, which just made his routine more dizzying. Mr. Right-Click and I decided that he had to either be a methamphetamine abuser, or have some kind of serious mental disorder on the bipolar spectrum to keep that level of activity going for so long. Or perhaps it was both. We were pretty sure he had some serious psychological issues, but in a way Westside Rentals Guy became our hero, Mr. Right-Click and I, because there’s a metaphor for work ethic if ever there was one. Dancing to no music with a sign taped to your arm on a street corner in Santa Monica for five hours at a time? That’s a tough gig.
One time, I was walking back to our apartment and Westside Rentals Guy was hanging out beside the door to Elias The Tailor (the best place to go for tailoring in LA, by the way), talking on a cell phone. I guess he was on a break. I tried to walk by without catching his eye because even if I was fascinated by him, I was a little scared of him as well. But as I passed him he was hanging up his phone with an excess of drama, and he asked me, “Why are people such assholes?” and I was like, “You know, I don’t know. They just are.” It was kind of cool to share this moment of acknowledged universal truth with Westside Rentals Guy, like we both just sort of acknowledged that yeah, it doesn’t even matter if you’re a graduate student who cannot finish her dissertation, or a possibly paranoid schizophrenic sign-twirler, or whatever — sometimes people are just assholes.
Over time, Westside Rentals Guy’s act got more elaborate. Somebody gave him a cape, and then a shield that read “Westside Rentals” with some kind of elaborate ensignia, like he was part of the Superfriends League of Justice. I believe at one point he was wearing a helmet. He became more of an oddity, people started recognizing him beyond just the people who were situated in such a way as to see him every day, like Mr. Right-Click and I were. He became sort of a local celebrity, like that guy who paints himself in silver on the Third Street Promenade, or that guy who dresses up like Batman and roller skates around Mission Beach in San Diego.
Eventually, Mr. Right-Click and I moved away from Santa Monica and would only see Westside Rentals guy occasionally, when he’d make it on TV for being outrageous at a sporting event, or if we happened to be in Santa Monica. He remained part of our cultural landscape, but not part of our daily lives. Until Monday night, that is, when my Dad and I went to the Lakers game against Orlando at Staples Center and, late in the fourth quarter, a guy carrying one of those clear plastic martini shaker things they give you when you buy cocktails at Staples Center, dressed in a trench coat, sat down at the end of our aisle. Shortly after that, he got up, started to take off his trench coat, and I said, “OMG IT’S HAPPENING!” and got out my iPhone camera.
My Dad was a little confused about the whole thing — both the fact that I could videotape something with my phone, as well as why we should be so excited about this guy sitting at the end of our row. As for me, I’m not sure I’ve been more of a dork when spying a celebrity in real life, except maybe when I saw Brad Pitt. And I guess what I’m trying to say is that, Westside Rentals Guy, wherever you are, you have arrived, my friend.
Just Like The Number Where 2+2=Six. A blog about life in the family Six, party of four.
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LOS ANGELES
Los Angeles is where I was born and raised. I always thought I'd leave, but for some reason I never did. Sometimes, I like it here. Other times, I'm not so sure. But good or bad, it has made me who I am.
Sometimes I take the melodrama of my life and twist and turn it until it looks almost charming. I do this because I want you to like me:
Cigarettes & Green Felt: This is about the time I figured out that adults were mostly full of shit.
Assburger: It's not just a disorder on the autism spectrum: it's also one of your relatives!
On Truth: Sometimes somebody will say something and it hurts your feelings. And then you will write a story about it and your aunt will call it "phenomenal." Everyone else will try to pretend like it never happened.
The Sheer And Unmitigated Power of Bob Mould: Sometimes you spend your formative years obsessed by an unrequited teenage crush, and then one day you realize that person is now an orthopedic surgeon who lives in your neighborhood. It kinda sucks when that happens.
Ben From Madera: For one Halloween, Ben dressed up like a bee, like that kid in the Blind Melon video. That's how I will always remember him.
Mr. Right-Click
He is my best friend, even if he uses a PC. And the fact that sometimes he will pretend to be a "Pancake Pirate" is only part of the reason. Arrrr!
Mini
His cutie-pie percentile group is off the charts.
Spinning
If you think this is just about exercise, then you have underestimated how wildly inappropriate people can be when they undergo physical pain in a group setting.
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