When I was matriculating at Brandeis University, there was a physical fitness requirement. You had to know how to swim (a lap or two in the pool and treading water for a few minutes) which made sense what with the dangers of a shallow water feature by the worship area on campus (read: sarcasm) and you had to do a much more rigorous workout consisting of running, push-ups and sit-ups. If you failed any of the above, you were required to take one or two semesters of physical fitness courses depending on what you were able to do. I passed the swimming portion easily, and did quite well on the other portion too, but missed opting out of the two semesters by one or two sit-ups or push-ups. (Ok, I wasn’t really trying because I thought a physical education class would be a nice break in my schedule.) I only had to take one semester, and since it came so easily to me I chose a swimming class (Water Aerobics, to be exact). It seemed a good choice on the hot day that we were sweltering inside the gymnasium; no one had the foresight to think about the fact that this water course would be taking place in November and December. I digress… back to the Water Aerobics.
It was filled with women. There was one other guy in it – some pale bespectacled young man with a ratty ponytail – which made for a gloriously empty locker room. Not that I would have minded some eye candy at that point in my life. That would have to be provided by our instructor, who (while mustaches were NOT my thing right then and there) had a decent, if lithe, build and a hairy chest. A throwback to those 70’s Olympic swimmers, minus the skimpy Speedo. Not quite my type, which was good, since I could focus on the task at hand: water aerobics!
Our instructor was decent, guiding us through various routines that utilized the water as resistance, enabling us to work out and tone muscle. The aerobics part came in the form of active repetition, and this was set to music. Like, 80’s music. The one track that we always ended with was ‘Higher Love’ by Steve Winwood, and if you’ve never done water aerobics to this song you have no idea how dumb and idiotic one human being can feel. Picture the lot of us doing jumping jacks in the shallow end of a pool, all in time to ‘Higher Love’ and you might have an inkling of how ridiculous the world is. Clearly something had to be done, so I took it upon myself to save this wretched exercise in embarrassment.
It was the fall of 1993, and Madonna was just embarking on her Girlie Show Tour, featuring songs from her latest album ‘Erotica’. It had a number of racing dance-pop tracks, easily on a BPM par with Steven Winwood. I quickly made a tape (since the instructor still used a cassette player) and slipped it under his door before class one day. Part of me thought he would never use it, but I had to try. The idea of jumping around in my swimsuit to Steve Winwood one more time was too unbearable.
For the next class the instructor said he wanted to thank whomever put the tape in his office, and then he popped it into the player. It started with ‘Fever‘ and we were off. Scissor-kicking through the water in time to ‘Deeper and Deeper‘ and forcing buoyant “weights” underwater along with ‘Words‘; if I thought it was funny doing water aerobics to Steve Winwood, doing it to Madonna’s ‘Erotica’ album was even more hilarious, especially when I thought of the fact that it was my fandom that started the whole thing. It took all my self-control not to break out in laughter, and at one point we were thankfully underwater so I could let out the biggest guffaw where no one could hear. It struck me as so comical, and I only wished my friend Ann could be there to see it. We would have drowned from laughing so much.
The only drawback is that to this very day a snippet of the ‘Erotica’ album will come on and I’ll be brought back to that pool at Brandeis. Thanks Madonna.
