Strength Training Again

I think it's ok to do strength training again. I did a strength workout last night on cardio rest day, and this morning I did about 1/2 a workout before spinning. I'll take it easy for a while, until it feels safe. I'll probably take a day off in between strength workouts, to prevent overdoing it.

I haven't mentioned it, but I ran into an old friend from those teenage vandalism years that I haven't seen or thought about in 25 years. I saw him in my spinning class, and he looked just the same as before. Of course, it turns out he's gay. I had no idea, and I never picked up on any signs. He acts the same today as before, and maybe he sets off a standard gaydar set, but I have no idea. I figured it out when I found him at the gay gym, and he had a guy sitting on his lap on the bench outside.

One of the reasons I work out at the gay gym is because I don't want to run into anyone I may know. At my local gym, I'll see a few people who might know me. At the gay gym, everyone is different, and younger. There's no reason anyone I know would be here.

The guy I ran into now talks to me a lot. We used to do a lot of juvenile vandalism in a set of friends that included my brother, and the Schneider's (two other brothers the same age as us). We'd do things like rip off the Pacific Bell phone trucks, do low-level phreaking, and computer stuff. It was a pretty formative time. This guy was a few years older than us, and we simultaneously looked up to him, and gave him a hard time. He had red cheeks, and in the group he was known as Pumpkin. I never called him by his first name. Sometimes his last name would be an alternate label for him, depending on context. But as far as we were concerned, his birth certificate said "Pumpkin". Come to think of it, I think this was his CB handle as well. Ahh, the 70's.

Anyway, I wish I could tell this guy I had a family and a life. I wonder what he thinks I'm doing at the gay gym. I get the feeling he's probing around a little when he asks me why I come all the way there, instead of my local branch. Also, he asks if I live alone. I try to stare at all the hot chicks that pass by as we have this conversation. I think he buys my explanation that I'm just trying to lose weight. I tell him I get into a routine (meaning I'm attached to this gym and classes) and he understands that. Maybe he's just suprised I'll burn the gas to drive here. I pick up on the fact that he doesn't have a lot of disposable income. He tells me he took off 8 years and lived out of his truck, just hiking every day. He also traveled a lot. I don't know anyone except well-off suburbanites, so I find it a little awkward discussing our adult lives. I'm not sure why he tells me all this. I'm not really comfortable talking about my life, so I try to avoid it. He just kind of puts it out there. I'm pretty sure I come off as being insecure. He probably wonders why. I'm working on it.