"Like a Fish out of Water..."

OR....like a fairly young and energetic fish in the rest-home of extremely old and cranky fish.
Let me explain...all summer my mom has been asking, begging, bribing (etc) me to come with her to HER water aerobics class called "SILVER FLIPPERS" Silver-for the color of everyone's hair, and for the type of currency they probably used in the barter system when they were growing up, and Flippers-for the type of flotation devices needed for this crew to not sink straight to the bottom of the pool. (Let me insert right here that my very young 63 year old mother is also WAY out of her element in this class...I think it just must make her feel good to be in SUCH better shape than these other duffs...) She has been wanting me to come because she wants me to certify to teach this class because it would be WAY easier on my knees than Aqua Dynamic. Well, I was at least 3 quarters of a century younger than everyone in the water...and they ALL eyed me suspiciously when I got in the pool. My mom was beaming proudly, and did not see that this was going to go from bad to worse in a hurry. As we started warming up, the mantra that I chant to my own aqua class came to my mind, "In the water you can make it as hard or easy as you want, but if you don't get a good work out, it's your own fault!" So, I decided to make the best of a strange situation and really work hard. Within ten minutes of class starting, I was jumping and kicking my way straight to the olympics, quite proud of myself for working hard, when I looked around and noticed that I had AT LEAST (no joke here people) AT LEAST a 6 foot berth around me in every direction. EVERYONE had moved as far from me as possible and were now glaring daggers at me. I moved towards my mom and said, "I don't think I'm very polular in this class" She looked sheepishly around and whispered, "Ashley! You have to remember that most of these ladies go get their hair done once a week, and they won't thank you for splashing them! You need to tone it down!" That's it! My mother was officially embarrassed that she had brought me. I thought it was a bit of an exaguration (the whole hair-do thing) but about 20 minutes later we were doing a floating activity (sounds riviting, I KNOW!) and the teacher said, "Now Gertrude (or something to that effect)I know you get your hair reset tomorrow, so you just lay back and start floating!" Now that's not something you hear everyday! I kept my head down during the rest of the class, but getting out of the pool was another issue. OF COURSE, everyone needed to use the steps, and I saw no less than one cane and one walker waiting at the top of hte stairs. I hopped out the side like the renegade I had been labeled as, and my my mom said I was NOT welcome to come back with her anymore! I was honestly working every minute not to burst out laughing at the situation, and the only thing that probably kept me from it was the fear that one of my coworkers or managers would come in and wonder why on earth I was taking a Silver Flippers class.