By Peter Molenaar

Visits to the Lake Street YWCA have become familiar to me, in the aftermath of thirty-five years hard labor at Smith Foundry. However, when worn ankles dictate, treadmills and elipticals wont do. It is from the vantage of a stationary bike that I am allowed to discreetly observe.

As for aerobics, evidently there are many women who have surpassed what I once was. One wonders why a world-wide movement of women has not been mobilized to fight ISIS. Sending our young men to war tends to make matters worse.

Recently, en route to burning 100 calories at 95rpm, the caption line on the big screen flashed BREAKING NEWS: NORTH KOREA THREATENS GUAM WITH MISSILE ATTACK. Amazingly, the elipticals and treadmills kept churning.

I happen to garden with the Koreans who founded the Community Peace Garden, at the junction of Highway 94 and Cedar Avenue. From them I received a copy of the spring issue of the Korean Quarterly with the front page caption: WAR PROVOCATION. The sum of Christine Hongs The Long, Dirty History was most impressive.

Unsurprisingly, few media outlets have reported on North Koreas overtures to the U.S., even as these, if pursued, might result in meaningful de-escalation on both sides. To be clear: peaceful alternatives are at hand. Far from being an intractable foe, North Korea has repeatedly asked the U.S. to sign a peace treaty that would bring the unresolved Korean War to a long-overdue end

Clearly, it is we who threaten them not they who threaten us. JUST SAY NO TO NUCLEAR WAR. Please. Yet, even I will return to the marvelous machines of the YWCA, as I intend to breathe for another thirty years.

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The Aerobics Beyond the Y - Alleynews