What's in the bag???

Most of the ridiculously early gym crowd heads off to the stone quarry after our workout. We have to make money to pay for our Y membership. It's a vicious cycle.

When I was a Swimmer Only I arrived at the gym wearing swimsuit underwear but otherwise dressed for work. So my bag was regulation size with only the essentials - goggles/cap/fins/waterbottle, makeup, ditty bag and a towel. Oh yeah and underwear. I felt very European with my spartan carry on.

Until the day you show up and the pool is CLOSED (someone shit in the pool, probably). I would speed home mad at the whole world, which is mostly made up of me, eat a big breakfast and wish I had brought my sneakers so at least I could have walked the track. I guess I have to learn the hard way: I decided to pack sneakers, tee-shirt, sports bra, shorts, socks, peds. I had a backup plan! So the bag got a little bit bigger.

When I started varying my routine because my "friends" said I needed to do more "weight bearing" I arrived in my sweats with whatever I needed on underneath - a "dry" or a "wet" workout, whatever the plan was. I added a CD player (which eventually morphed into a Shuffle). Plus swim gear JUST IN CASE and gym gear JUST IN CASE.

The bag got a big bigger still.

Comes the day when your bathing cap splits open or your goggles just aren't there, you forget underwear or socks or a belt, you need a band-aid, a pen, a dollar for a bottle of water, damn two more ibuprofen, a hair dryer because the Y doesn't know how to buy in bulk, a safety pin, tampons, a new razor, lint brush, or pantyhose. Throw it in the bag.

Bigger bag.

Someone is always forgetting something. We dress in a hurry and it shows. No belt. No socks. No bra. No towel. There aren't too many women that can wear my bra (an "almost A") but we've bailed each other out a few times. One lady always "forgets" her bra. Yeah right. Sometimes we just have to go to work mismatched or just not happy about the outfit. Like anyone will notice.

Now I have TWO bags - one with my clothes/shoes and another with all my gear. I have an extra everything. Plus a snack. They were accepting book donations not long ago for a fund raiser and when I walked in with my box the lady at the desk asked me what I had and I just said "Damn, I spend so much time here I decided to just move in." She didn't even blink. She knows me.

The bags are as big as me almost and weigh more than I do, but now instead of being proud of my spartaness I try not to look like an idiot carrying all this stuff around. About 6 months ago on a weekend morning a man asked me "What's in the bag???". I looked at it and said "I have no idea. I can't wait to find out!"