who have poignantly decided that
despite having serious weight issues,
they will join a class and get fit.
We all have our own challenges.
Mine include highly vulnerable ankles
that could never take this kind of exer-
cise on land.
The water, and its glorious buoyancy,
makes all of us athletes.
the good news about aquafit is that it’s
democratic and devoid of vanity. We
care not if your body is “beach ready,”
as those women’s magazines terrify-
ingly put it as summer looms, so there’s
no perfect-bathing-suit emotional sur-
tax. (I’ve always maintained that any-
one who wants to sell bathing suits to
women should be an accredited ther-
apist.) I splurge on special aquafit out-
fits, but others wear old suits until they
lose the battle to chlorine.
Aquafit is focused on our bodies get-
ting stronger. And because there is a
clear link between aerobic exercise and
improving mental health—from mood
disorders to memory loss—aquafit
helps you as you age. (Occasionally
my phone auto-corrects it to “aquavit,”
and I may one day need those memory-
boosting benefits to distinguish
between the two.)
My very close friend (another Judith)
got me going to this particular class
because she knew I would love it—and
because once it was over we could
routinely drink tea and debrief from
our busy weeks.
Judith began aquafit a few years
back, after surgery for a non-malignant
brain tumour. It not only got her mov-
ing again and ramped up her heart rate,
it even lessened her chronic head pain.
She describes the joy many of us feel
during, and especially after, class as
the result of being “invigorated, ener-
gized and relaxed.”
Some of the women in the pool have
had big careers: professor, doctor, brain
researcher, head of a tech company.
Some have never worked outside the
home, and some have lived lives so
fascinating that I’ll tread water to find
out more about them.
One of them was a very pretty woman
in her 80s who dared to wear a ridicu-
lous pink polka-dotted shower cap from
the dollar store in the pool. (On her it
was haute couture.) She had always
done sports. As we water jogged, she
told me that she was once a special
assistant to a media baron and had
travelled the world for her work.
For a while, I didn’t see her around.
I missed her. When she came back, she
told me she’d had “a bit of breast can-
cer.” Yet there she was, back in the pool.
She died not too long after that.
It made me realize that in deter-
minedly going to aquafit, no matter how
young we are, we’re all playing the
long game. I’ve now even got my own
ridiculous flowered shower cap.©OF AQ 2019, JUDUAFIT CULTURE,” THITH TIMSON. FROE TOMRO “THNTOE LO STARNG (APRIL 8, LASTING JOYS
2019), THESTAR.COMrd.ca 47