Jumping with Jordan - Michael Sheridan

I swing the car into the McDonald's drive-thru. I’ve just got Max from school.  I’ve had too many customers today, and no lunch because there was no time.  Max is also usually hungry after school and he is now.  We’re in a hurry to get to the gym.  We’ll probably be 5 minutes late without the food stop; 10 minutes with it, but it’s better than us both being hungry. 

We drive off with Max quietly demolishing chicken nuggets. A few minutes later, there’s a tug on my sleeve.  I put my left hand back and let him guide it to the problem.  I feel the problem in my hand.  It's a sauce sachet.  It feels a little bit slobbery.  He’s been trying to get it open with his teeth.  I take the sachet forward, peel it open at the next red light and give it back.  Silence descends once more in the back of the car.

Two minutes later we’re at the gym.  Exactly, the time that Max had needed to eat the sauce with his fist.  He’s probably sticky, but we’re too late for me to bother cleaning him.  Besides that, he’s already out of the car and headed in the door. 

Jordan intercepts Max halfway across the room, directing him to the bouncy inflatable mat.

"He may be sticky", I warn.

"Seems okay", says Jordan with a cursory look.

They bounce together and run up and back for a few minutes.  Max remembers the giant rubber resistance bands and flies off towards them.  Jordan arrives just as Max has collected a few and helps Max pick the best ones.  These will get used later as part of a bouncy swing.  Max takes the band and glances at the metal frame across the room.  Then runs over and hangs the rubber band as high as he can get it. 

Max wants to build the swing, but he's not tall enough.  The top of the frame is up near the ceiling.  The rubber band needs to go over the frame.  Jordan is trying to make Max ask for help.

Jordan starts to assemble the rest of the swing, but Max is now headed towards the Swiss exercise ball, which he carries and dumps next to the step-up blocks.  Jordan leaves the swing and follows Max.

Normally, Jordan rearranges the blocks to hold the Swiss ball wedged in one place.  This way Max can jump on it, but Max knows how it goes, so Jordan waits to see how much Max will do himself.  As the pile of blocks approaches toppling point Jordan removes his drink and his iPad, just in time.

Then Max hesitates for a moment.  The blocks fall back to where they started.  He's distracted again.  There’s a broomstick propped up against the blocks.  Max is not sure what to do with it.

“Hey Max.  Give daddy the stick “ , I say. 

Max gives me the stick.

Turning back to what he was doing, he accidently bumps into the kitchen door.  It swings open.  I notice a sign on the door that says staff only. 

“Hey Max.  Stay out of the staff room.  The staff room is for staff only.”  I say.

Max looks at me.  I point at the sign.  Then lifting the stick, I say, “Can Daddy put the staff in the staff room?"

Jordan tells me I’m a bad person.

Max is back to rearranging the blocks.  The blocks get arranged so that two of them hold the enormous Swiss exercise ball against the wall.  Jordan then stands on the blocks and Max bounces up and down on the ball.  This originally started with Jordan holding Max's hands, but part of Jordan's job is to help Max develop core strength, so now he makes Max do it one handed.  That's why he makes Max push the blocks around himself too.  It also helps with building engagement through constructive one-on-one play.

After a few minutes of the bouncing ball and Max is back to the swing.  Jordan helps him finish constructing it.  I call it a swing, but it's sort of like a sling shot.  It think it's fashioned from a harness that might be used when lifting stuff, and this is the seat of the swing.  The two rubber bands form the chain parts.  Early on, Jordan would bounce Max up and down on this.  Balance with resistance is good for building core strength.  Now Jordan sits a distance away and fires Max, letting him recoil back.  It must take work to hold on and balance.  I can see this building core!  It also seems to make him tired.  Another plus.

*

Max first started going to the gym a few month after I did.  In my sessions, I had become accustomed to the serenity at the gym.  Having a personal trainer at a private gym means you are the only customer, so it's peaceful.  I would really get into the serenity whilst laying on my back on a soft mat to work on breathing exercises.  I could even stay in this zone whilst lifting weights, forgetting about the outside world.  When Max started, we thought it made sense to have his session at the same time as mine, with a different trainer.  Then I didn't need to coordinate childcare, or travel there twice.  However, having Max there at the same time made things less serene.

Say for instance, that Jordan is getting Max to lift and tow the battle rope.  These are heavy, and just moving it is work when you are five.  However, Max is convinced that these cables needed to be plugged in, so he plugs the battle ropes into the weight benches, even if Blake has me face down on the weight bench trying to row.  Or Max might just need to check in with me, while I am rowing, and a small cold hand, perhaps a sticky hand, will creep up the back of my shirt.  Maybe Max wants to know what I am doing there, and he climbs on to my back to share it with me.  Blake was impressed that I could concentrate and maintain good technique with that level of distraction.

On the first combined session, Jordan tried a number of experiments.  There were lots of different things he gave Max.  Max would examine them, then carry them somewhere and drop them.  Max would find other things he could carry, relocate and drop.  Jordan is happy with all of this because getting Max to lift, carry and drop heavy things was going to build core strength and coordination.  By the end of the session the place is a wreck.  The battle ropes are crisscrossing the room and tied around weight benches. Small dumbbells and medicine balls are all over the place by the dozen.  And the cushions from the sofa in Jordan's office have been scattered around the gym.

I am trying to not pay attention to all the activity.  A couple of times I noticed little things, like the Swiss ball bouncing past while I was on my back breathing slowly in and slowly out.  There is also the frequent rounds of intermittent strobing while Max plays with the light switch.  But mostly I don't look.  When I do look at the end, I am astonished.

"Sorry about the mess", I laughed.

"Don't worry, I'll get Blake to clean it up", said Jordan

Blake laughs.

It looks like a bombsite, but amazingly, Blake and Jordan have it all back together in minutes.

"Max.  Stop licking the weights."  I say, "You don't know who else has licked them before you."

I was joking.

"Don't worry", interjected Jordan, "It's only been Blake."

Blake and Jordan seem to like poking fun at each other.  Today, it is to be mostly Jordan, but Blake seems quietly amused.

Months later, the new trainer Paul has been taking Max's sessions.  We still call it Jumping with Jordan, but Paul mostly takes Jumping with Jordan, so it's 'Jumping with Jordan' with Paul.  One day, Paul is showing Max the assault bike.  It's an exercise bike with moving handles.  Max licks the assault bike.

"Hey, Max", I say.  "Don't lick the assault bike.  You don't know who else has licked it before you."

Straight of the cuff Paul says, "Don't worry, it's only been Jordan."

*

During my sessions Blake generally asks me how I am.  He likes to get a sense of how stressed I am, whether I am eating well, sleeping well, and what else is going on outside the gym for me.  He says that if I am working hard in the gym but not losing weight, he needs to know why to do his job.  This of course leads to me complaining about Elizabeth.  I am sure that if anyone was asked persistently enough about their spouse, they would complain about them too.

Jordan owns the gym.  Jordan is not my trainer, Blake is, but Jordan is Elizabeth's trainer.  I train mid-morning.  Jordan is around during doing business stuff at this time.  He also has taken a lot of sessions for Max, which I am always at, so I talk to Jordan a lot.

Jordan explains to me one day about how personal trainers double as psychotherapists.  He says, "They actually covered that in my sports science degree.  Early they tell you, 'When you set up your gym, buy a red coach.  If you don't like hearing about people's personal problems, switch out of sports science now.'"

"So Elizabeth must complain about me all the time?", I ask.

"No.  Mostly she complains about Damian."  Damian is her business partner.

"Probably because she comes here straight from work."

"Yeah.  Probably."

"So why are you married to her if your always complaining about her?"  Jordan asks me.

"That's easy.  You're supposed to be married to the most annoying person you know."

"Why would you marry someone that annoying?"  Jordan asks, amused.

"It's how you know you're married to the right person."

"What?"  Jordan seems to think this is the most outrageous thing he has ever heard.

"Someone explained it to me once", I say.  "An old guy I was talking to on a bike ride asked me about my girlfriend.  'How is she?'.  That was before we were married.  I said, 'She extremely annoying.'"  I can't remember why now, but something she had done had bugged me.

"So, he said to me, 'Is she the most annoying person you know?'"

"'Absolutely', I said".  I remember I'd been surprised, but laughed.

"He said, 'Good.  Marry her.'"

"What?" says Jordan.  "That, so does not make sense.  He told you to marry Elizabeth because she was the most annoying person you knew?"

"He went on to explain to me that, 'It's how you know you're married to the right person.'", I said.  "It's the most helpful relationship advice I have ever been given.  It doesn't matter how annoying she gets, I can always say, as far as it goes with choosing who to marry, I am an over-performer."

Jordan is clearly not convinced.

A while later Elizabeth comes home from the gym and says, "Jordan says that you and I have turned him off marriage".

We both laugh.