Go to the Gym -- Do Your Best
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My workouts are on a slow simmer. Should I raise the heat and seek a boil, I invariably get scorched. Cold is intolerable, room temperature makes me sick and comfy-warm puts me to sleep. I should have been a seamstress -- cooking is driving me crazy.
In case you missed the party, I had my 69th birthday over the weekend. What a day of celebration. Laree made me my favorite dish, Campbell’s tomato soup with chunks of frankfurters, and allowed me to choose the evening’s TV schedule. She’s the greatest.
From now on I am no longer “in my sixties.” I am “going on 70.” What a revolting predicament this is. They say you’re only as old as you feel, which turns out to be no consolation whatsoever cuz I feel like 80. But, then, how would I know? I’m going on 70.
Simmering, in my observation, is not a bad strategy as we get older. A slow simmer is just below boiling and has a nice quiet bubble to it. It’s something one does for an extended period of time to carefully produce full-body flavor and appeal. Boiling is harsh and chaotic, splattering the source of its life-sustaining ingredients.
What am I trying to say here, bombers? Simple: Don’t count your bubbles before the steam rises.
“Bomber sounds particularly confused this week, big Bob.”
“Whataya expect, giant Jim? He’s going on 70.”
There are always a couple of wise guys in the crowd. Ignore them and, like little farts, they go away.
“Wonder what he does for his arms these days, ripped Ruddy, now that it doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Evidently not much, large Louie. They look like a pair of wilted carrot sticks.”
“Don’t tell me, huge Huey. He’s gone vegetarian?”
If I ever get my hands on those five skinny little shrimp, I’m gonna make hamburger outta them.
I did have a good arm workout this Sunday, now that you mention skinny little shrimp. Some things never change; other things remain the same. It was part one of the same routine I did 10, 20, 30 and 40 and 50 years ago, only these days I skip part two (the hard part), and do the workout one day a week instead of three. Of course I use lighter weights, perform fewer sets and reps and modify the exercise grooves to compensate for injury, swelling, pain and limitations in action and range of motion.
Like I said earlier, I should have been a seamstress.
Now… What you’ve all been waiting for, the routine: Standing barbell curls supersetted with lying triceps extensions and barbell wrist curls (4 sets x 8, 12 and 15 reps respectively). Baboom!
Oh, so you heard it all before. Oh, so you can do better. Oh, so you would use dumbbells on an incline supersetted with overhead triceps extensions and pulley pushdowns. Bully for you, great, all-knowing dude… er… actually, that works. It is, in fact, part two of my original, awesome record-breaking gold-star arm training scheme of the latter 20th and early 21st century.
Seriously, mature lifters of steel, do you think we gather here once a week to talk about indisputable Colbert-Draper arm routines, or how to build classic Don Howorth deltoids? C’mon. Get real! We are here to convince each other what a wonderful thing it is we do when we go to the gym and lift weights.
“Why, it’s for our health and character and inner joy, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,” we declare. Gee, that gets old fast. “It’s a journey across the deserts and mountains of life.” Barf! Lifting weights is hard and tedious and mind-numbing labor, pure and simple. The mind says, oh, my aching back, are we done yet; the body moans grievously, and the soul is wide-eyed, jaw-dropped silent, bearing today’s most common expression, “What the...?”
It would almost be amusing if it wasn’t so desperate. Let’s face it: We‘re grown men and women, most of us with jobs, families and responsibilities and we drag ourselves before the racks of iron for unrelenting, self-inflicted torture, which leads to pain, exhaustion and submission. Brilliant. What, are we nuts? It’s all so bizarre.
I’m going on 70 and think it’s time I take the lead and put an end to this nonsense. We need clarity and decisiveness, maturity and coherency. (I should run for president.)
Scuz me a sec, zoomers… just checked my word count and I’m at 720 as I reach for 900 to 1,000. The newsletters have been longer in the past, but with the advent of facebook and twitter, readers favor brevity. By the end of the year I’ll be down to a few symbols, abbreviations, codes and mysterious signs. Personality, authenticity, care and depth of encouragement and information will decline as we continue to hurry nowhere at ever-increasing speeds. Zoom… Just sayin’.
And, now, returning to the heart of our conversation without skipping a beat, when I think of Don Howorth delts I think of press-behind-necks and side-arm lateral raises in superset fashion, and steep-inline dumbbell presses similarly combined with bent-over laterals. I think of focused warm-up reps and the 12, 10, 8, 6 sequence for power and mass and muscularity. I don’t think of injury or excessive training cuz I’ve affixed upon my imaginary barn-door shoulders the driven and fearless head of a youth who dismisses pain as irrelevant.
Gotta love the youthful mind, zoomsters. No one says it’s sensible, but it sure is fun and it gets things done. Be-here-now is cool and tomorrow-will-care for-itself works well for today… tomorrow’s another story altogether.
Laree reminds me it’s Wednesday and I must go to the gym or I’ll be depressed and whiny by nightfall, and I’ll refuse to eat, saying something about a loss of pump, rhythm, purpose, momentum and internal delight. I’ll be in what she calls the pit of anguish due to guilt and shame. I’d better go to the iron heap immediately if only to sooth the lass. Loving, sensitive spirits can over-react.
Be strong for them, your loved ones, by God… Dave, the B-69
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