Won’t you take me to… gossip town?

Picture that this woman, rather than dancing with crazy eyes, is actually talking to her girlfriends nonstop in the locker room, by the weights, and in the hallways headed to the different places in the gym. They’re all talking at once. They’re not talking about anything in particular. But they are continuing almost without breaths.

That’s what it feels like at my gym.

There is a group of women who sit in the multi-purpose room and gossip. They start out in the locker room, discuss the basics and catch up, and then eventually go to the multi-purpose room and continue talking. They just talk. Did I mention they talk? There’s so much talking.

So. Much. Talking.

While I think it’s great that people have gym buddies, I’d like to make a little pitch that the gym part overshadow the buddy part just a little bit.

Maybe we stop talking for a little bit and just focus on the workout? Maybe for like five minutes? Three minutes? One effing minute? Maybe you just stop to breathe? Maybe you recognize that the other people around you aren’t interested in hearing your mundane, loud gossip? Maybe you realize that you’re not actually working out that hard because you’re not letting yourself get out of breath because you’re too busy concentrating on talking? Maybe you realize that that half-assed stretch you’re doing right now isn’t going to make those already-tight pants fit any better? Maybe you stop talking? Have I mentioned it’d be nice if you just stopped talking?

You’re putting even Chatty Cathy to shame. She wants to bang her head against the wall because of your incessant talking. We all do. You’re making everyone else in the gym want to hurt themselves. And that’s dangerous because it’s a gym so there are a thousand ways of really doing damage to your body. Just yesterday, when you three decided to all discuss the same terrible TV show at once, I looked at the punching bag next to myself and wondered if I let it loose and land on my head and my head exploded all over the ground if that would make you notice there was someone else in the gym and maybe make you stop talking. I had that thought. And it’s your fault. All of you.

So shut it. Shut up. Quiet. Keep the gossip to a reasonable level. And maybe contain the gossip to the locker room.

But mostly… please… just be quiet.

Please.