Pool friends make a big splash at Newport-Mesa Family YMCA’s Mermaid-a-Thon
Mermaids are usually the stuff of legends, but at the Newport-Mesa Family YMCA, a popular water aerobics class transforming area residents into mermaids and mermen on a daily basis is always happy to induct new members.
Offering classes six days a week, the facility’s Deep Water Aquafit program is a draw to Y members looking to cool down while engaging in a form of physical fitness that’s easy on the body but still offers a rigorous workout.
Suspended on the surface of deep water by flotation devices, students receive all the benefits of a traditional workout — flexibility, heart health, endurance and stress release — with none of the impacts associated with a gravity-based regimen.
But in recent years the class has also become a regular rendezvous for a group of water-fitness devotees who call themselves the Mermaids and who’ve formed a special bond that reaches far beyond the parameters of any YMCA pool.
Newport Beach resident Robin Sinclair became a mermaid about eight years ago and describes the class as a giant play date, where friends keep in touch, share stories and support one another through life’s happy, and not so happy, moments.
“It’s really hard to make friends when you’re older, unless it’s around children or animals,” says Sinclair, 66. “But I’ve made friends in that pool that I would never have gotten an opportunity to meet otherwise. Now it’s like I’ve got friends for life.”
She recalled how the Mermaids rallied around a class instructor, a woman already well into her senior years, who’d had a fall. They brought her meals and transported her to doctors appointments. When she had to go to a rehab facility, mermaids visited her regularly.
In addition to holding monthly potlucks, the Mermaids always make a point to mark the holidays together or to celebrate birthdays, weddings or honor someone’s passing.
“It’s definitely more than an exercise class, that’s for sure,” Sinclair attests.
Class members in February held a “Mermaid-A-Thon” during the YMCA’s Annual Campaign fundraiser to pay for scholarships for residents who can’t afford their own memberships. Participants paid $40 and made merry for two hours straight, enjoying snacks and mermaid-themed party favors while raising $800.
It was such a hit, the Mermaids recreated the event on Friday as more of a get-together than anything else, although modest donations for pool equipment and other needed items may have crossed fins.
Once in the pool, members splashed and frolicked with one another in a series of fun and active games typically reserved for school-aged swimmers.
Kendra Crusco, executive director of the Newport-Mesa Family YMCA, says helping people build relationships in their local community centered around health and wellness is par for the course at the Newport Beach nonprofit.
But the Mermaids take it to a whole new level.
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” Crusco says, describing how the group opens its arms to new members, bringing them into the fold as they celebrate and support one another.
“They really lean on each other — they’ve been through the good and the bad. They’re doing everything within our walls but also outside as well.”
Maryanne Krasinski, a 75-year-old “bicoastal Mermaid” who splits her time between New York and Newport Coast, attends Deep Water Aquafit classes on a near daily basis when she’s in town and instantly reconnects with the Mermaids, about 85 members strong these days.
The 45-minute sessions are places where tips and referrals are exchanged, which can be invaluable to people in need of a handyman, repair service or attorney.
“Some of us have had knee replacements or hip replacements and usually give a good recommendation for a doctor at the YMCA pool. I found my shoulder doctor at the Y,” Krasinski says. “Whatever you need, you just have to ask.”
Sinclair agrees there’s no place like the Newport-Mesa Family Y for fun times, fitness and friendships.
“Getting in that pool, people are laughing and having so much fun as they work their bodies and stay in shape,” she says. “We always joke it’s like that movie ‘Cocoon’ — you get in that pool and everything’s OK. You can have a stiff neck or a stiff back, but at the end of an hour, you feel like a million bucks.”
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