Social Circles
I haven’t seen this mentioned on here yet, so I figured this was something worth telling. Has anyone else noticed that gyms tend to have their own micro-community, kind of like a small village or local pub? I joined my gym in November and was kindly shown around by a staff member to orient myself on my first day.

About half an hour in I had finished with the cardio equipment and moved on to weights. You know that awkward exchange of looks when you approach something at exactly the same time as someone else, and you try to figure out who gets their way first? This happened between me and some burly looking bloke. He looked at me, took a swig from his water bottle and began to frown.
“You’re new here.” It wasn’t a question. I began to wonder where this was going – had I committed some kind of gym-folk faux-pas? Perhaps he was just pointing out that I was round in the middle and skinny in the limbs. Bastard. But I couldn’t say that to his face.
“Yeah. First day.” I said, wondering why I was bothering with this exchange when I could have just used a different machine. Surprisingly, he smiled and introduced himself. He nodded toward the machine and told me to take my time, and to take it easy. “Oh, you work here?” I asked. I remember him laughing, shaking his head and telling me he was an accountant. I was a little weirded out by this (that he was a friendly gym-goer, not that he was an accountant) but quickly learnt that this place was actually pretty social and most regulars either knew each other by name, if not by face.

Over the next couple of months I became familiar with most of the “evening crowd” – those that finish work around 7ish and want to work out before heading home. One thing I had never expected when I joined was how much networking went on in this place, both socially and commercially. In the first month I was there I had found out two couples had started dating, one member gave another a job and if I wanted a travel agent that would cut me a discount I should talk to someone called Linda who could usually be found on the cardio equipment, etc. Before I knew it I actually enjoyed going to the gym to hang out with others. I wasn’t a very social person at the best of times so it was good to regularly see people I got along with. The fitness was a bonus.

Thing is, every community has its douchebag, the individual universally regarded as a weed in anyone’s garden of friends. It wasn’t that he lacked gym etiquette or behaved awkwardly in the changing rooms. No, this was much more subtle. This was the kind of guy that has to one-up everyone, the wanker that would claim he had a fiveskin if someone else said they had a foreskin. The subject of an inferiority complex dealt with by pretending to be the best at everything.

You know the type.

Now imagine that this guy wanted to single you out. Perhaps this story would have belonged in the bullying QOTW for all the little jabs he’d have at my expense. Now, I could handle bullying. Ignoring people like that becomes an art form when you’ve dealt with it through school, and I was 23 at the time. No, the difficult part was the unexplained vendetta he seemed to have against me. Imagine that someone you know is telling your friends that you’ve been backstabbing the very people that welcomed you to your social circle. Not nice. Remember how I mentioned Linda above? I went to organize a trip to Australia for me and my girlfriend and figured I’d talk to Linda about it. Turns out she didn’t want anything to do with me and told me between breaths (she was on the treadmill) that I had “one helluva nerve to come to her.”

Naturally I hadn’t seen this coming and my attempts at ascertaining what her problem was were going ignored. I asked someone else about why she was so pissed at me. I eventually found out Linda had been told by the gym dickhead (named Dave) that I had collided with the manager’s car in the car park and blamed her for it. Yes, it sounds like a watered-down TV drama but in real life these things matter, God damn it.

I confronted Linda and pointed out that I not only jogged to the gym but it wasn’t exactly in my nature to say stuff about other people like that. When I later found out that Dave was responsible I made a point of telling the gym gossip-queens about his behavior towards me (the most efficient way to spread any news).

Not everyone believed a grown man could be such a child til they paid attention to him when he talked to me. Some even tried talking to him about his behaviour but he vehemently denied any wrongdoing. Word eventually got around about Dave, but really there was no way to deal with him. He paid gym fees so he could come whenever he wanted. But nobody had to be his friend.

Though the gym itself was one of those massive international chain affairs the evening crowd was fairly small. Soon Dave wasn’t included in conversations; chats would end quickly upon his approach. He could tell what was going on. He must have. Eventually he took to bringing his iPod to the gym and kept it on the entire time he was there. He was being shunned, and though I figured he deserved it I couldn’t help but pity the twat.

Given he was in purgatory for his own actions there was little I could do. Perhaps I shouldn’t have said too much to the gym-folk, but I couldn’t unring a bell and decided to leave him be. Eventually he would stop turning up in the evenings at all. Last I heard the staff had noticed him bothering the lunch crowd.

Just comes to show that even adults can act like kids in the playground, can’t they? Perhaps so-called "playground politics" and the kids involved are just caricatures of adults in the real world.
(thecurriedavenger, Tue 14 Jul 2009, 1:37, 3 replies)

Yea, it's strange to think that adults can actually act like this,
and they can be a hell of a lot more vindictive than kids.
I remember experiencing "office politics" and I was shocked, I guess I'd just presumed that all adults were more mature than children.


Nice story!
(TheColonel, Tue 14 Jul 2009, 9:36, closed)

Office politics is at the same time the most amusing and tragic thing in the world. I try my darnest not to get involved buit when it's an integral part of your employment sadly you find yourself embroiled.
( whenanimalsattackhumans clad in global hypercolour, Tue 14 Jul 2009, 18:01, closed)

You work
in Parliament?
(Bernard Bernoulli, Wed 15 Jul 2009, 10:08, closed)