Subject: gym article
From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1996 07:56:17 -0500

Hello,

Hope you had a gay and good holiday.  Attached is a recent article I had
publihed that I would like to post on the QRD.

Thanks

[email-masked]

Scenes From Chelsea Gym
Michael Shernoff, MSW

Originally published in LGNY December 1, 1996.

Gay gyms have always been places for more than body building.  They often function as samll de-
facto community centers for the men who work out at them.

Beginning sometime soon after it opened, those of us who worked out early in the morning at
Chelsea Gym began to refer to the group of regulars who would arrive between 6:00 and 7:00
AM as "The Dawn Patrol."  Numerous friendships developed among the men, and many of us
socialized outside the gym based on the camraderie we felt working out at the same time day after
day, week after week, month after month.  One time one of the men and I co-hosted a Saturday
evening party for single employed men of Chelsea Gym who were husband hunting. Over forty
men attended. It was at this party that I first asked the man who was to become my partner to
spend the night, and he accepted.

One morning an announcement over the public address system spoke for itself.  "Gentlemen, may
I have your attention please.  Try to remember that this is Chelsea Gym, not Chelsea Baths."  We
all roared!  The gay comic Frank Maya had  referred to the Chelsea Gym steam room as "The low
self-esteem room" in one of his acts.

Another morning, Leonard, the young man who worked the desk on the early shift, got on the PA
system and in a very serious voice said: "Gentlemen, may I please have your attention?  Please
stop what you are doing and pay attention to a very important announcement."  We began to look
at one another and wonder had the president been assasinated or had war been declared?  "I
regret to inform you that Lucille Ball has just passed away at a Los Angeles hospital.  Let us all
observe a moment of silence in her honor."  And we did, with not a few people becoming choked
up.  Now really, where else but a gay gym would that have happened?

One Halloween morning one of the regulars, a slender, but very well built attorney originally from
the San Francisco Bay area was doing his regular work out, only wearing a splendid pair of
pumps!

As AIDS began to take it's toll, there were certain noticeable changes and ultimately losses in the
ranks of the gym. Notices of deaths and upcoming memorial services would appear on the bulletin
board.  I remember checking out a lovely looking man in the locker room, only to be surprised as
he took his shirt off to see a Hickman catheter taped to his chest.  After overcoming my  brief
moment of shock I immediately thought "how brave that man is to just come in and bare his chest
with that indication of his being on infusion therapy for AIDS."  I got very overcome with feelings
and became teary eyed in admiration for him.

Another man David continued to work out even when his arms and legs were covered with KS
lesions that he was having burned off.  One day shortly before he died I saw David working out
with the assistance of someone else, only he was completely blind by now and still at the gym. 
Talk about a profile in courage and stamina. 

One of the stories that is closest to my heart has to do with the play Jeffrey.  On a friend's
recommendation my partner Lee and I got tickets and went to the WPA theater on West 23rd St
to see the play knowing nothing about it except that it was gay themed.  Imagine our surprise
when it turned out that the story line was very much our story.  Lee was an HIV positive
unemployed actor who was earning his living as a cater waiter at Glorious Foods when we met at
Chelsea Gym.  This is the story of Jeffrey.  We were introduced to Paul Rudnick, the author of
Jeffrey at a party, and teasingly asked him if we could get royalties since he had written our story. 
His reply was that he knew it was someone's story, only he had not known whose until then.

Immediately after Lee's death I was literally inundated by men expressing condolences and
inquiring about how I was doing when I returned to the gym.  Some were not even people I was
friends with, but rather had only known to say hello to on the floor of the gym.  No one seemed to
mind when I broke down in tears telling a story about a particular part of his dying.  Could our
gay gyms actually be one venue where while pumping up on the outside to look like traditional
American men a culture of gentleness, concern and nurturing male support is flourishing?

Michael Shernoff is a psychotherapist in private practice in Manhattan.  He can reached either at
his home page http://members.aol.com/therapysvc or via e mail at [email-masked]

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