How to Talk About God With a Personal Trainer
My personal trainer’s name was Ed. Actually, it was Mohammed, but it was understandable that he chose to go by Ed because of, well, Kansas. America, too. He was from Dubai, which he said was like another planet. I believed him.
He had a pretty thick accent, and said things like “more two” instead of “two more.” Totally hunky, with short, curly black hair and big arm muscles. What they call soulful eyes. Probably my age. He had me doing all kinds of exercises: throwing a medicine ball on a trampoline, lifting heavy ropes, running and touching cones, and, of course, sit-ups — on an exercise ball, on the floor, on a downward-facing bench. Endless sit ups. When I said I hated working my abs the most of any body part he looked at me and said, “I can tell.”
I was very embarrassed that I had a personal trainer at all, and told no one except Nick. Whenever I was telling a story to a friend and it would involve working out, which seemed to happen quite often, I would have to edit myself and switch “personal trainer” to “friend,” such as, “When I was talking to my….friend at the gym.”
*
“What is Dubai like?” I said to Ed.
“It’s hot,” he said.
“But it’s hot here,” I said. (It was August in Kansas).
“No, it’s not,” he said.
This flash essay is from the book How to Explain by Louise Krug (Finishing Line Press), and can be found at https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/how-to-explain-by-louise-krug/
In How to Explain, Louise grapples with the misgivings and longings inherent in who we truly are instead of who we’re supposed to be. With a wry wit, acute eye, and refreshing honesty, she writes about how to look at social media without hating herself, how to stop volunteering, and how to navigate seeing double in a singular world. Along the way, she explores how to talk to her personal trainer who thinks she is going to hell, what kind of exercise inspires the least amount of self-loathing and how to explain her differences to her kids’ friends. She captures the humor, surprise, and strange puzzle pieces that come together in being an adult human on her own terms.
Louise Krug is the award-winning author of Louise: Amended (2012) and Tilted: The Post Brain Surgery Journals (2016). Louise: Amended, was one of Publishers Weekly’s Best Nonfiction Books of 2012. Krug has published essays in The Huffington Post, River Teeth, Juked, various anthologies, and elsewhere. She is an Associate Professor of English at Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas, and lives in Topeka with her husband, Nick, and two children, Olive and Bruce.
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