Sam Smith - When your editor was a kid, he was the one they sent out to right field where he would do the least damage. When he got to college, he gained fifty pounds and became known as Fat Jolly Sam. Not appreciating this title, I secretly began going to the gym and pumping iron, not a particularly respected activity in the 1950s. Before I graduated I had lost most of the gained weight and was vigorously combining intellectual activity with pumping iron. This essay, written when I was almost 40, describes the progression. Forty years later, as an arthritic 80 year old, I can no longer bench press 300 pounds, but I still ride my recumbent bike most days while watching bad Netflix series, and work out on my Soloflex machine. Pumping iron has been right up there with EB White as positive influences on my life.
On pumping iron
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