Geriatric Zumba

By Irving Wardle

It was an ad in the local paper that did it. It promised easy-going classes for the over-60s which would guarantee heightened energy and all-round well-being. Although they went by the passion-killing name of Prime Time, I signed up for the classes and became addicted on the spot. I liked the instructors. I liked the exercises, and all went well for a few years until the week when, to my dismay, Prime Time vanished from the timetable.

I should have seen this coming. Our numbers were in decline. What had been a boisterous roomful of 20 old ladies and me had shrunk to a defiant last stand of four or five old ladies and me. Big Sheila had been claimed by her grandchildren. Betty had to look after her sick husband. Chubby Barbara had died of cancer. Other men seldom came near the class, preferring to torture their biceps and glutes with pieces of machinery, or sit in the locker room ranting on about football. My impression was that the women came to the gym to do themselves a bit of good, whereas for the men it was somewhere to escape to.