Reconsidering

It's no secret that I hated LA when I first moved here. It was big and ugly and waaay too sunny for me. I also had no job, therefore no money. And yes, fine, I'll admit it - I'm not crazy about change, ok? Fine.

But gradually, things got better. And after crying for about 6 or 7 months, I stopped "hating" LA and started "not loving, but definitely tolerating" it. It helped that I was working somewhat consistently and living in a new and improved apartment without any silverfish.

Unfortunately, things have turned sour again. You see, in LA, it's a law that you have to belong to a gym. Being a law-abdiding citizen, I joined LA Fitness about a year ago. And several times a week, I put in the mandatory 30 minutes on an elliptical machine, which is possibly one of the most boring things in the world. Even with an ipod or a Harry Potter book, or even an ipod with a Harry Potter book on mp3, it is excruciatingly dull.

And that is how I became an avid fan of the fitness classes. I took my first cycling class exactly one year ago, and it changed my life. Classes are an hour long! And while I have never ever ever exercised for an hour on my own, the power of shame is a great one, my friends. In a class with a teacher, I can't just leave after 25 minutes because I'm tired or bored. I mean, other people can, but I am deathly afraid of drawing attention to myself and being silently judged. So I have no choice but to soldier on.

So I cycled as much as I could, but Kate was by far the best cycling teacher at my gym. Not only was she upbeat and encouraging, but she also frightened me a little. Because despite being an adorable little lady, she is roughly one zillion times stronger than me. She is like, superhuman strong. But not in the scary female bodybuilder way. More in the, wow, I aspire to have triceps like hers way.

I also enjoyed her mid-workout anecdotes. With other teachers, it's like, "C'mon guys. You can go faster than that! Go go go!" But with Kate it's like, "C'mon guys you can go faster than that! Do you want to be alone on Valentine's Day, eating hershey's kisses and rollerblading around your house because you're so bored?!" How could you not love that? So naturally, Pat and I became total Kate groupies. If Kate was teaching a class, then we were there. Eventually, she started teaching at a different location, so that's where we started working out. Perhaps she moved to that location because we were stalking her, but whatever. We may never know.

I even branched out to a class called Bodyworks. I did it the first time the day before Thanksgiving last year. Resultingly, I could not move my legs or arms for about three days. But I learned to love it as well. I decided that Kate was the greatest factor in my continuing to live in Los Angeles. I was pretty serious when I said that if Kate ever left, I would seriously reconsider living here.

Well, the worst has happened. Kate is moving. I'm pretty torn about this. I mean, Kate knows we love her. And I think she likes us enough to not be creeped out by the way we follow her around from gym to gym. But would I be classified as mentally ill if I started making major life decisions based on my cycling teacher? Like, I don't reallllly think I should move to Boston just because Kate will be there. But would it be the worst idea in the world? I don't know.