Fitting in is hard, particularly in a leotard.

The other day I went to a body step class. As one who usually restricts her athletic activity to the solitary anonymity of the treadmill line, participating in classes has been cause of apprehension in the past. But the body pump class (named that way because Les is really aiming for water cooler innuendo when you explain to your colleagues why your arse is so sore – I actually said I was “sore but satisfied” the other day) hadn’t ended in tragedy, so I thought branching out to something different would be a good idea – that and my headphones were shot and I couldn’t see myself lasting a significant period jogging to the Pitbull party tracks gym radios seem to blast at full volume.

I jumped on my step with high hopes and attempted to walk like the perky lady on the raise platform in front of me. Easier said than done. As the instructor added combos and step changes willy nilly (probably not willy nilly, but to me, that little shuffle came out of nowhere and had no business being in an exercise routine.) I thought that surely everyone else would be making the same faces as me. But, apparently I was alone in a room full of women.

I looked around and noticed it. They were subtle when roaming the wilderness alone, but when they were herded together in a grapevinning pack it became clear what I had stepped into.

The excellent posture was more than stern parenting. The flex-sneakers that meant you could point your toes and not slip across the floor was no coincidence. Neither was the way they could figure out how to get all the hair off their faces and still look feminine. They wore their work out gear with personality – they weren’t wearing the faded sports bra they’ve been rocking since high school, with three dollar five pack socks. They didn’t just throw any junk on to sweat in public. These girls had a workout wardrobe, with coordinating colours instead of multiple shades of “this will keep my boobs from looking like a pair of condoms half-filled with water” and “this will keep my stomach from looking like a lave lamp on the treadmill”. They had workoutfits, because they liked to look good while working out. Because that’s what dancers do. And I was in a room filled with dancers or ex-dancers.

Suddenly, I felt like the shorter, but probably just as heavy six-year-old dancer who had followed her sister to jazz-ballet classes. I couldn’t master the box-step or the grape vine and my shimmy was shithouse. And as one of the two chubbier girls who pranced about in what was essentially underwear, I felt a little out of place (particularly because the other girl could actually dance). I stuck out like the fat bulging out of my armpit over the slightly-too-tight leopard. Technically I am also an ex-dancer, but the extent of my prancing career was hardly glittering. My first year culminated in me skipping around in a circle then sitting down on-stage while wearing a red hessian sack. The second year saw me wear a black swimsuit and a straw tail while skipping around in a circle (again) and progress to turning my head in the same direction as a young Jonathon Taylor Thomas told me to. Now, most of my dancing incorporates heavy thrusting, squat-walks completed with a dash of some kind of fit. We were not of the same flock.

And it showed. While they leapt around their mini stages like fluoro-clad gazelles, I was more akin to the hippo floundering in in the mud. To make matters worse, I was wearing my black National tee shirt.

While my dress was now appropriate for my body type, I was that bulbous second armpit again. I have never had the urge to step ball change in my life, but suddenly I felt completely worthless because I couldn’t dance to the Rogue Traders’ Voodoo Child.

I usually try to wrap these little rants up with some kind of takeaway message as an end that justifies my meaningless existence, but I’ve reached my word limit and can’t seem to come to any profound conclusion. But I can leave you with this: if you’re trying to convince yourself that you weren’t that bad leaving a gym class don’t look the instructor in the eye, because that well-meaning “it gets easier!” remark can’t be pushed aside as easily as the undie-bit of your leotard when you need to pee.