Planet Fitness, a place of self improvement, self discovery, and a place of no judgement. On an average day I go to the gym and lift late in the afternoon or at night. Today was different, I decided to go early in the morning before my classes. I woke up at 7:30am and went to Planet Fitness at 8:00am with two of my friends.

The drive to the gym felt longer than normal. The sun was shining down from the east with such an intensity to it that I could not see the various stoplights until I was much closer. As we pulled into the parking lot, I noticed there were not as many cars as usual.

The first thing I noticed as I walked into the gym was the fact that my friends and I were the only people there under the age of 40. I walked up to the counter to scan my phone and it took several attempts to scan when on an average day it takes one or two attempts.

As I began my workout I noticed that my mind was still not fully awake but my body was ready to go. I began on the cable machines, using a straight bar for bicep cable curls. The straight bar was squeaking with every rep like a grandmother’s old rocking chair.

Next, I noticed the smell. All of the other people in the gym were using the sanitizer as if it were a bottle of Febreze. I could feel my nose hairs crying for help while being singed off thanks to the sanitizer being used like air freshener.

When it was time to leave my friends and I did the same thing we always do and weighed ourselves whilst talking about how good of a pump we got. As we walked out of the gym I noticed that the sun was no longer shining down with as much intensity as earlier in the morning.