The Danger of Earbuds - A True Story

Earbuds.  Insidious devices that let one shut out all other sound and hear only what comes down those tiny, tiny wires and into one's outer ears.  Earbuds block other voices, other sounds.  The wearer can be magically transported into a private reality of music; a reality not shared with other people nearby.  Or farby, for that matter. 

Case in point: moi yesterday at the health club.   I'm happily logging miles on the treadmill, getting ready for warm weather outdoor activities that take some endurance.  Making my heart and lungs stronger.  Making the blood just whoosh through arteries and veins and capillaries and organs and such.   The treadmill area is on a balcony overlooking the weights and machines and mats and bosu balls and foam rollers and such in a big area below.

It's 10:30 AM, the time when the club is populated with fitness moms.  Moms who can afford not to work, who drop their kids at the daycare room then work out work out work out until noon, when they all disappear.  Moms with muscular arms and shoulders and abs and legs.  Moms with not-a-hint of excess fatty tissues on their frames.   Some are near me, on the treadmills or the ellipticals or stair climbers or the bicycles that go nowhere fast.  it's a pleasant environment for exercising my peripheral vision, while not looking or staring. Okay, well, glancing maybe, but only once.  Or twice.

 Run run run pant pant pant.  Then this comes down my earbuds.



Stevie Nicks singing a favorite from long ago.  Singing in a tempo that perfectly matched my running tempo and mood.  Perfectly.  I start humming, thinking to myself stan ding in a line... doing a quick foot shuffle in time to Mick Fleetwood's drumming.


Then singing stand back stand back.....stan ding in a line...na na na nah nah nah.. 

I AM Stevie Nicks, shaking my head, pretending I have hair. But I need a little sympathy!

So I walked, walked out of line...one man did not fall when he asked me....  Waving my arms, fist clenched like I'd just won a gold medal.  Thumping my feet onto the treadmill in perfect time to music only I could hear.  If I had had silk scarves with me, I swear, I would have twirled.

'Sall right!  'Sall right!  Then the music stopped.  I hopped my feet to the side of the treadmill so I could fish the iPod out of my shirt pocket and hit replay.  Great song, man.  Then I noticed that people - fitness moms - were looking at me.  Looking askance, then averting their eyes.  Ah, shit.  It dawned on my that I had become that guy at the club who sings on the treadmill.

They all looked away.  I pretended nothing had happened, toweled off, turned off the treadmill, took a slug of Gatorade out of my bottle, and casually walked away.  No one seemed to have noticed.  But the last woman on the last treadmill in line whispered "Dude!" as I walked past.

Maybe I'll skip the earbuds at the club this morning.