Perfect

by Gwen Cooper — August 15, 2007

(*bonus points to anybody who can correctly identify the source of that title!)

I've heard stories for years about people finding dates at the gym, but I've never believed them. I always thought the idea of meeting potential partners at the gym was the stuff of dating mythology--like the way we're all lured with promises of meeting Mr. Right at the bookstore or in the grocery store's frozen-foods section or while volunteering at the local hospital. Clearly, I thought, the people dispensing this advice haven't been out there in the dating trenches for quite some time.

My main reason for disbelieving such gym-related dating stories is that the gym is manifestly an "ugly" place. I mean you're sweaty, your hair is matted, you have no makeup on, and half the time you're contorting your face into the kind of pained grimaces that remind one more of torture chambers than bedrooms. And even though there's always at least one woman working out in your vicinity who has the kind of body you know you'll never get even if you were to starve yourself and spend six hours a day at the gym--even she, you can't help thinking, couldn't possibly look her best while actually in the process of working out.

So maybe that's why it took me so long to figure out yesterday that the guy hovering around, as I made my way from treadmill to weight machines, was actually trying to strike up a conversation. At first I was annoyed, thinking he was simply trying to use the same equipment I was using, and not well schooled enough in gym etiquette to avoid making me feel pressured to hurry up. And when he tried to talk to me, I was even more irritated--what with the aforementioned sweating and grimacing I was busily engaged in. Who feels like making idle chitchat when the only thing you can think is, "Sweet mother of God, this machine is f---ing painful!"

It didn't even dawn on me that he was "interested" until he (clearly discerning that he was getting nowhere with his more subtle approaches) came right out and asked for my phone number. Catching a glimpse of myself--in all my sweaty, pit-stained glory--in that big, mirrored wall they inevitably install right across from the weight machines (why???), I couldn't help thinking, Um, did this guy just get out of prison or something?

Of course, I had to tell him that I was already spoken for, and that was the end of that. Still, it was something of an object lesson, and the moral of the story was: Never rule anything out. Even when you look your absolute worst, there's probably some guy out there thinking: Yum! Sign me up for that!

Gwen Cooper is the author of Diary of a South Beach Party Girl, recently published by Simon & Schuster. To read all of Gwen Cooper's posts in "The Dating Life," click here.