Carlos

Environment is stronger than willpower. Environment is stronger than willpower. Environment is stronger than willpower.

I repeated this Parmahansa Yogananda quote like a mantra while crossing the frozen Schuylkill River bridge to the gym. It came out in puffs.

All those Ayurvedic guys say if you treat your body — your sacred temple — right, everything else gets handled. I treated my sacred temple like shit for decades. I was an angry, self-destructive kid and then, somehow, middle-aged.

“You’re no longer a party girl,” a friend told me once. “You’re a party woman, and that doesn’t look good on anybody.”

She was right.

The drinking got grim. I got sober. I started teaching yoga. There was some overlap with the drinking and the yoga which was, as you can imagine, hilarious.

Now I’m 66 and everything hurts. I used to think old people in yoga classes were overly cautious. Now I understand. No young trainer truly understands an aging body unless they’ve lived in one.

“Give me the oldest trainer you’ve got,” I told the guy at the front desk.

“That would be Carlos.”

Perfect, I thought. An older refrigerator-shaped Mexican guy I could practice Spanish with.

Then the guy looked over my shoulder.

“Actually, he’s here now.”

I turned around to see a huge, handsome Black man extending his hand toward me. Former NFL linebacker for Philly. Not remotely the Carlos I had pictured.

I liked him immediately.

His fee was $85 per half hour if you bought six sessions.

“I’m going to have to sell my dead mother’s jewelry to work with you,” I told him.

“Aiight.”

He gave me a free session.

I walked into the weight room and saw him about thirty feet away. He didn’t say hello. He just pointed.

“Warm up.”

I wasn’t used to being ordered around by somebody with absolutely no weirdness attached to it. No ego. Just authority.

I did a little ‘Yes, sir’ spin and power-walked toward the cardio machines like an obedient sitcom character.

The workout was amazing and nauseating.

Even though my book, Tap Dancing for Daddy, is partly about performing for male approval, I immediately wanted Carlos to admire my grit. The man has a PhD in discipline. I worked hard enough to feel sick.

“Where would I even throw up?” I asked.

“You can use that garbage can,” he said calmly.

“I think I’m going to hate you tomorrow.”

“You’ll be alright.”

This was Carlos. Mostly walk, very little talk.

At one point I tried handing him cash directly instead of paying through the gym.

He carried the money straight to the front desk.

“People like you and me,” he said, “we don’t go under the radar.”

I felt oddly proud of that.