I often joke that I moved to Suburbia, but we didn’t really move that far, only about 20 miles southwest of where we were before.  There is world of difference, though, when you drive west on the 101 over the hills of the San Fernando Valley into the Conejo Valley.  The temperature drops 10 degrees, there is less traffic, less crowding, and for me a lot less stress.  (Let’s not talk about my poor husband just now.  After 20 years of a 30-second commute, he now faces 45 minutes each way.)

I did have to sacrifice the Thursday night Zumba with the super hot instructor who granted me a private lesson in booty shaking.  There’s no location of that gym chain out here, so I canceled my membership and started walking every day and doing The Shred.  (This is how I feel about The Shred.)  That?  Is not working.

Since I’ve moved to Suburbia and started working from home during the four hours a day that I am not with children, I’ve definitely needed more exercise.  Luckily there is a Zumba class at the rec center right around the corner from my house!  I finally tried it out last week.  Since I had worked so hard to get my endurance up during my last run, I was confident that I would not die, and how bad could it be?  I figured I would dance in the back of the room and nobody would notice me.

Oh, but this is Suburbia.  And the class is at a Rec Center.  Who goes to rec centers on a Monday morning?  Other stay-at-home-moms and old ladies, that’s who.  As I walked into the class, the instructor spotted me and said “Look everybody, a new face!  What’s your name?!” All heads turned toward me in the not-so-large room.  So much for blending in and nobody noticing.

The choreography of Zumba is actually handed down to instructors from on high, so it’s pretty universal.  I followed it well for a while, until I realized just how out of shape I’ve become.  I wondered for a bit if I would, in fact, die.  Zumba would kill me after all, it just took moving to the suburbs for it to happen.  I could see the headlines:  “39 Year Old Mother Of Two Dies During Meringue at Community Rec Center.”  Unwilling to see my life reduced to such tragedy, I willed myself to get through the class alive.  Those old ladies weren’t making me feel any better, zipping through the routines like pros in their special Zumba shoes (there are such things!). There was not a flabby body in the room besides mine, and I’m not just being self critical.

The instructor of this class is a White Lady, not an exotic Jennifer Lopez lookalike with a big booty.  Still, she can shake it, but in a decidedly white girl way, so at least she makes me feel like I, too, can achieve maximum booty shakeage if I just get a little more limber.

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More posts about Zumba:

10 Things About Zumba

10 More Things About Zumba