“Get the endorphins flowing”

—Hooray, hooray!
I was able to talk to my aquacise-instructor. It wasn’t much, maybe 3-4 minutes, preceded by “Got a minute?”
This isn’t a complaint. It’s an observation.
That aquacise-instructor is an instructor. Other female contacts I have at that YMCA swimming-pool are lifeguards.
Instructors are always busy. For me to talk to her is butting in. Talking to her the other day was butting into a client session.
And unlike the lifeguards we have a lot more to talk about: like my ongoing struggle to improve my balance.
And outside that pool are many more lady-friends I developed since my wife died. And we’re not dealing with questionable balance.
A really pretty girl once told me what women like most is laughing. And I no longer avoid pretty girls.
So for my lifeguard friends, and outside that pool, we can just shoot the breeze, make each other laugh, and (this is my aquacise-instructor) “get the endorphins flowing.”
I sure can’t do that in 3-4 minutes, and I miss it: make each other feel good.
We did it a while ago: walked our dogs together at a park in Canandaigua; three times actually.
Nothing since, except five minutes here, a minute there, maybe 20 seconds there.
As I say this isn’t a complaint. It’s how things are: she’s an instructor.
As you all know I’m a graduate of the Hilda Q. Walton School of Gender Relations. “NO PRETTY LADY WILL SMILE AT YOU!” And that aquacise-instructor did.
She was one of the first, if not the first, to get me past Hilda.

• I do aquatic balance training in the Canandaigua YMCA’s swimming-pool, two hours per week — plus a third hour on my own.