Going in, I was pretty nervous. I’ve been doing Zumba since last August
and I know my stamina, coordination and balance have all improved, but I’m a
big girl and I’m forty-something instead of twenty-something, so I was scared
that I wouldn’t be able to keep up.
Friday morning I was coming down with a fresh head cold and had barely
slept the night before. I was really tempted to back out and stay home. But
with a little encouragement courtesy of Ted, I threw on one of my nerdy
t-shirts (REPRESENT***), strapped my nerdy glasses firmly onto my head, grabbed my
water bottle and headed over to a local YMCA.
Oh. My. Gosh. Very high energy, very friendly, very positive, very
Italian! I hid in the back so as to avoid any direct confrontation with our
intimidatingly enthusiastic instructor (plus… I always hide in the back, that’s
my spot).
He has a fierce look on in this pic but he was SO happy, crazy-bouncy, and nice! |
But I kept up! The moves were totally doable for me, just with a ton of
exuberance and a lot of instructor-audience participation involved. I dripped sweat
onto the floor within the first ten minutes (I always consider a class
successful if I notice I’ve sweat droplets on the floor around me). Raffaelle
was up front, on both sides of the room, then he was in the middle of class,
then splitting us into two halves for a dance-off battle, then doing the tango
with one of the class members, it was nuts and wild and so much fun!
I was so proud of my instructor from Retro! (There were five of us
total from her class in attendance). At one point Raffaelle called her to come
dance with him up front and she jumped in with both feet like the badass Jedi she
is. I’m clapping and grinning in the back of the room like, “YEAH – that’s my
teacher!” Still no shouting or whooping on my part though, I have yet to overcome
my verbalization aversion.
I would absolutely do this again, and I’m not calling myself a Zum-Newbie
anymore either. I’m not a Zum-Jedi Master (and I sadly have yet to evidence any
superpowers as a result of my adventures), but I feel comfortable at least
calling myself a Zum-Padawan.
Me, my instructor, and four of my classmates with Raffaelle (and his Italian flag, of course!) |
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