The next day, Malarkey decides he wants to go to the campus fitness center to work out. Malarkey rarely, if ever, does that, but for some reason he decides he needs to “get fit.” Whether that “fitness” has anything to do with meeting Liliana, a woman half his age, and who, Malarkey imagines, must have a “great ass,” is open to interpretation if one needs to interpret those sorts of things, since it’s manifestly obvious that Malarkey thinks “working out” is somehow going to impress Liliana more than she is already impressed which would assume she’s impressed in the first place. Something else that’s open to interpretation. Perhaps, it has more to do with the fact Malarkey and Liliana have gone out on more than one occasion and though they have yet to be “intimate,” the Reader can surmise that their intimacy is inevitable and Malarkey believes that a few trips to the gym “pumping iron” will make him look more appealing in the nude. Malarkey is often delusional.
When Malarkey strolls into the fitness center wearing a kind of “retro” workout outfit, he draws the attention of many of the students not only because he’s the only faculty member there, but because of his retro outfit. The outfit is retro not in the retro sense that it has suddenly become fashionable to wear a retro outfit, but because it’s the only workout outfit Malarkey has ever had since his days at Oxford: an Oxford sweatband around his head; baggy, navy blue stretched out sweat pants without the elastic at the ankles; a threadbare Christ Church College sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off and a pair of stained green Converse tennis shoes (vintage ’68) the hemp shoelaces of which have been shorn and the aglets lost to eternity.
After the initial interest in Malarkey’s arrival, no one really pays any attention to him as he begins his “workout” by climbing on a stationary bike and pedaling as a “warm up.” Just why Malarkey thinks beginning his workout with cardio is better than ending his workout with cardio is primarily due to what Malarkey thinks best even though he might be wrong. Malarkey is often delusional. After fifteen minutes pedaling at approximately one mile an hour Malarkey feels sufficiently warmed up enough to begin a weightlifting routine that he gleaned from www
After scanning the gym, Malarkey finds the dumbbell rack and assumes ten-pounds is much too light for him to begin with even though he’s not conditioned for it, he instead picks up two twenty-five-pound dumbbells. At first, Malarkey believes he can actually curl two twenty-fivepound dumbbells and, based on the images from the websites, he assumes the proper position to do so. He stands with his torso upright and a dumbbell in each hand, held at arm’s length. His elbows are close to his torso and the palms of his hands face his torso. Theoretically, while holding his upper arm stationary, Malarkey should start to curl the right weight forward while contracting his biceps as he breathes out and continue the movement until his biceps are fully contracted and the dumbbells are at shoulder level then he should slowly bring the dumbbells back to the starting position and breathe in. Theoretically.
But theory and practice don’t often mesh and as Malarkey attempts valiantly to curl both twenty-five-pound dumbbells, eight times for three sets, he realizes he cannot curl one twenty-five-pound dumbbell once let alone eight times for three sets, so Malarkey returns the twenty-five-pound dumbbell to the rack and picks up the ten-pound dumbbell and proceeds to curl both of them flawlessly eight times for three sets convincing himself that at his age strength is not as important as tone and after he finishes those “grueling” three sets moves on to some rowing exercises.
Now the rowing exercises were recommended to Malarkey by his internist who said strengthening his back muscles would at least help with the spinal stenosis he has if not the arthritic hip that’s advocating for replacement sometime in the near future. Once again, Malarkey has to decide whether fewer repetitions with heavier weights would be more beneficial than higher repetitions with lighter weights. Believing he might look like the bodybuilders on the website (he recalls photos of Arnold and Lee Heaney) he opts for more repetitions. Malarkey is often delusional. But Malarkey has to figure out what weight to begin with. So, he stacks up one-hundred-pounds since that seems like a solid round number.
Malarkey positions himself on the machine, places his feet on the footplates in front of him and makes sure his knees are slightly bent, but not locked. Then he leans over as he keeps the natural alignment of his back and grabs the V-bar handles. With his arms extended, he pulls back until his torso is at a ninety-degree angle from his legs. Theoretically, keeping his torso stationary, Malarkey should pull the handles back toward his torso while keeping his arms close to it until he touches his abdominals. He should breathe out as he performs that movement as he squeezes his back muscles hard and holds that contraction for a second before slowly returning to the original position while breathing in. Theoretically.
Malarkey makes sure he has positioned himself in the proper rowing position, feet firmly planted on the footplates in front of him, holds the V-bar with two hands and begins to pull it back while keeping his back straight. Unfortunately, the one-hundred-pounds did not move once, let alone eight times for three sets, and so he reduces the amount of weight to thirty-pounds and proceeds to pull the weights eight times for three sets convincing himself that, at his age, strength is not as important as tone and after he finishes rowing he moves on to try some bench presses since the website indicated bench presses were the ultimate fitness exercise and Malarkey certainly wants to make sure he’s fitting that into his fit routine even though after only a warmup and two exercises he’s beginning to sweat a lot.
As Malarkey slowly walks to the bench press, he notices his student, Wilson, and some of his jock cronies, staring at Malarkey and chuckling to themselves if not at Malarkey’s attire, then at the fact Malarkey is there at all. Of course, Malarkey ignores them as he tries to decide how much weight to put on the bar. The bar itself weighs forty-fivepounds so he considers how much more he can add since lifting a barbell without any weight on it seems ludicrous to him and he doesn’t want to look more ludicrous to students who, by all measure, think he looks pretty ludicrous already. So, he spots two twenty-five-pound weights and “slams” them on the barbell (mimicking the manner in which weightlifters slam weights onto barbells for effect) for a total of ninety-five-pounds. Surely, he can bench press ninety-five-pounds, eight times for three sets, but Malarkey is often delusional.
Malarkey lies on the flat bench. Using a medium width grip, Malarkey lifts the bar from the rack and holds it straight over his head with his arms locked. Good so far. From that position, Malarkey breathes in and begins lowering the bar slowly until the bar barely touches the middle of his chest. Theoretically, after a brief pause, he should push the bar back to the starting position as he breathes out and he should do that eight times for three sets. Theoretically. What wasn’t on the website was the distinct possibility one may not be able to lift the barbell off one’s chest once it’s there nor does Malarkey recall the website indicating the use of a “spotter” just in case one cannot lift the bar back onto the rack as it slowly dies on one’s chest and reduces one’s ability to breathe, which is what happens in Malarkey’s case.
Feeling the bar slowly crushing his sternum, as Malarkey struggles mightily to lift the dead weight from his rapidly caving chest, a pair of helpful hands easily assists him in lifting it back onto the rack. Malarkey looks up at the owner of the helpful hands and is somewhat startled when he notices that it’s not Wilson (whom the Reader probably thinks it is as well, since that would be the most obvious person and would lend a certain irony to the Malarkey-Wilson connection) but it’s Matthew who wears a Gold’s Gym tank top and black lifting gloves. From the looks of Matthew’s biceps and his popping veins, it’s apparent that he’s not a novice at the practice of weightlifting.
“Uh, thank you, Matthew, I was afraid I might stay forever as I lay dying.”
“You’re very welcome, professor. Just let me know if you ever need a spotter. Sometimes it’s not good to lift alone.”
“Yes, I’ll keep that in mind.”
Matthew smiles and walks off as Malarkey wipes the sweat dripping from his forehead. Before Malarkey leaves, he stands in front of the mirror, as most bodybuilding narcissists do, in order to see the “progress” he’s made after one meagre session. But Malarkey realizes that regardless of the time he expends trying to “bulk up” or “trim down,” in the end it amounts to the same thing and all he can say to himself while gazing in the mirror at the same image he started with is, “After many a summer, dies the swan.”
Malarkey no longer goes to the fitness center. He is now thinking about taking capoeira and boxing lessons. Malarkey is often delusional.
(At this point, the Reader has the option of listening to the Moody Blues’ “The Afternoon: Forever Afternoon” or not. It makes no difference to Malarkey.)