The Thrill of the New

It's been a while since I've tried anything new; by and large, I'm a creature of habit (always ten minutes late for work, despite my best intentions - mainly because I can't break the habit of going to bed around midnight, and thus can't get up at the appropriate time in the morning) and I don't like change. I admire those people who run towards change like a giddy child, shouting 'Pick me, pick me!' and waving their arms aloft. They don't know the meaning of a comfort zone - what use would they have for such a dull concept, with all its implications of staying still, cowering under the duvet, with all one's boundaries firmly set out. Even if it turns out you don't like what you're going to get (the sinking feeling that I am constitutionally incapable of getting up, having a shower, getting dressed, making myself some breakfast, eating it, brushing my teeth AND putting on make-up in the space of an hour), you feel safe knowing what the likely outcome is.

But we all know that trying new things is the mark of those who are Young at Heart and now I'm 40, I'm all about trying not to be cowed by my middle aged status. My work colleagues may take the piss for my ongoing fondness for Radio 1 (I'm so far out of their demographic I might as well be listening to it from the Mir Space Station), but it's the only way I get introduced to any new music. Much as I love it (especially now that Adam and Joe are back in their rightful slot on a Saturday morning), a gal cannot survive on 6Music alone. So it is that I find myself listening to Nick 'Grimmy' Grimshaw before bed, as he chats to listeners who are studying for their GCSEs and I pretend to be interested in what dubstep is, whilst wondering if I should perhaps just grit my teeth through the adverts and the ever-present station idents and retune to Absolute 80s instead.

But moving with the times is an ongoing process, so let's not fret too much at this juncture as to whether my fondness for Lady Gaga's art-pop offerings mark me out as tragic or Magic (FM). No, this week, I decided I would try something new in the world of exercise. Flailing about on machines is all very well, I thought, but surely at the weekends, I should mix it up a bit. Challenge myself! Try something different. So it came to pass that this morning, I went to a step class. Yeah, screw Zumba and trendy fusions of yoga, pilates and boxing, I decided to go old skool. Stepping up and down, with some occasional arm-waving thrown in, I'm sure I can manage that, was my thought process. Besides, I was cheating a bit, it wasn't entirely new to me, a step class. There was a time at university in the early 90s when I used to do loads of step and aerobics; gyms weren't a big thing then; it was all communal classes and the same routines for years at a time - you felt like Jane Fonda merely because you knew how to 'grapevine' and had nailed when to go to the left and when to head off right.

I thought step might have progressed in the intervening years, but it really hasn't (other than the fact that this morning's class was taken by a man. Judging by the amount of whooping on offer, I suspect he might not have been wholly heterosexual, though). A third of the way through the class, I remembered why I hate step and its ilk - it's repetive, exhausting and full of the kind of people I hate. The kind of women who wear crop-tops and have bouncy ponytails and who not only know all the routines, but who are well enough co-ordinated to actually execute them. Whilst whooping with joy at how much fun they're having. Oh God, they're so smug. They crack jokes with the instructors. They probably go at least three times a week, because they love it so much. I bet they have friends that they've made through going to step classes.

They do not resemble Bagpuss, struggling with a particularly bad hangover after a night on the tiles with the Mice on the Mouse Organ and Gabriel the Toad (such a caner) and struggling to remember which is his right and which is his left. Above all, they do not misjudge how far they are away from the step during one manoeuvre and go flying off it, landing on their bum. Really painfully and embarrassingly. My coccyx is still killing me. I bailed out before we had to do 'matwork' because I thought I might be able to save the morning by going to the yoga class that's taken by the Grumpy Scottish Man. Yes, that's how bad going to a step class was, going to GSM's yoga class was cheering in comparison (I could do all of it, it didn't require me to hop over a small step whilst waving my arms around and I didn't fall over).

So, step classes can stay in the early 90s; they can carry on a-whoopin' and a-jumpin' without me. I'm going back to what I know. It's pretty difficult to fall off a rowing machine.