Muscle Memory

I have read that muscles have a memory. Not really like a brain having a memory, but more like a rechargable battery. If you work out regularly, as a part of your life but then get sidelined by whatever . . . your muscles will "remember" where you left off. True, it takes a couple of weeks to get back into the shape that you once were when you stopped working out, but then the muscle remembers and suddenly it gets easier to work out.

Well, I was at the gym today. I was thinking about that, but then I got to thinking about why I do the exercises that I do. And, I tend to do those exercises in a particular order as well.

When I start to work out, I start by stretching -- trying to reach my hands to the floor -- hard at the beginning but then as I warm up it is easier. As I did that today, I heard Debbie Rodenski's voice telling me how to reach to the floor and to round my back as I rolled up slowly.

Wow, I hadn't thought of Debbie in a long time. She was my jazz dance teacher for about 15 years.

Then that got me thinking about the next exercise. I heard Pablo Malco's voice telling me to walk my hands away from my feet so that you are in an upside down "V" and then keeping my hands flat, walk my feet in place one and then the other. Then he would tell us to bend our elbows so that we were doing a sort of upside down push up. Pablo was my hip-hop dance teacher.

Okay, now this was getting fun.

Then I was sitting on the floor, feet flat against each other and knees flat on the mat. Now I heard Nancy Clouse telling the girls in the American Gymnastics gym in Margate to flap the knees up and down like a butterfly and then touch your nose to your toes! Nancy and I taught gymnastics together when I first moved to Florida.

Then lying on my back, knees bent, feet flat on the floor -- I heard Mrs. Schneider (Danny's Mom) -- telling me to raise my hips to the ceiling (she was my Yoga teacher in at the Y when I was in high school!

Then I had one foot flat on the floor, knee bent, the other leg bent with my foot on my knee and that knee facing the side wall (confusing I know). Reaching inside and around the leg and pushing with my elbow -- never mind too hard to explain -- I heard Kenny, another jazz dance teacher from the University Center telling us how to stretch out our hamstrings.

Well, you get the idea. But what really amazed me is that my routine is a compilation of all of the various activities I have done over the years. I have gathered the best of the best and repeated them to create my own workout. I suppose that is what most people do. But I remember and thank all of my teachers who have inspired me to keep going.