The gym is one of the places that help me get in the right mindset to be productive. For me, the gym is an automatic reset and refresh. This semester the weight room and other facilities obviously have had a cap on how many people can attend at a time and there are online sign up sheets and check-ins (you show your ID so they can trace everyone who has been in the vicinity so if someone gets COVID everyone who could have made contact will be warned).
The wight room has machines, weights, mats and treadmills. As a woman I have noticed that it is predominantly a male space as I find myself being the only female in the gym many nights, I have also found times when nobody is working out so I can invite my girl friends (who many of them already feel awkward in a gym space and especially we are the only women) to workout. For example, Fridays after 7 pm often are empty and I can have the facilities almost all to myself.
Pamplin sports center has a basketball arena, weight rooms, locker rooms, meditation, and fitness centers. There is the Zehntbauer Swimming Pavilion next door, which now isn’t open to the public, but it has a 25-yard pool. I don’t play a sport but I do lift every day and it’s a welcoming and exclusive place where you don’t have to be an athlete to attend. The nice thing about Lewis & Clark is that the campus is very small and accessible so walking to the gym from the dorm rooms is easy.
During COVID I am so thankful for the gym. I am so grateful for space where I can get out of my head and stop worrying about assignments and just get my body moving.