HARVIN COLUMN: Challenge leads to new community of friends

How are your New Year's resolutions going? One of my resolutions was to get out of the house more and meet people. It also was to lose weight, exercise more. You know the ones that we all list.

But for the first time in years, mine are going well, but only because I've found a new community to help me keep them. And it was a community I didn't expect to find.

I joined the MUSC Healthy Charleston Challenge, which is 12 weeks of weight management, nutrition education, team workouts and accountability for progress.

In other words, a structured program for anyone who seriously wants to lose the weight and get in shape at the same time -- and keep it off. I figured I would struggle and I hoped to make it through.

Now, I've seen "The Biggest Loser" on TV, so I know about the team competition, and this program is based on that idea, but without the elimination factor. I wasn't sure what to expect.

But this isn't a column about how to lose weight or exercise. It's about how in trying to do something new, you often discover a new group of people, some shared values and, yes, a sense of humor.

That is really what joining an organized program is all about. At our recreational centers, there are so many ways to find a small new community. Nearly every one of them has some form of weight-loss program, but you don't have to lose weight to find some like-minded people.

Maybe you want to just get out of your comfort zone a little, like Anita Zucker does when she dances. She and partner Andrey Gergel quickstepped through the "Dancing With the Stars of David 2012," a fundraiser at Synagogue Emanu-El that emulates the famous TV show.

Five members of the congregation teamed up with professional dancers from the Fred Astaire Studio, and practiced for two months to perfect their moves. It sounded like a lot of fun.

Or how about Drucella Smith, the coordinator for the Franke Home Chorus. She was concerned that the public know about the chorus because they want more people to join for the famed Mother's Day Tribute concert. It's an event that both the chorus and the residents enjoy and look forward to every year. She wants singers of all types, and it's a short-term commitment. (Rehearsals start Feb. 7. Call her at 881-1158 if you want to join.)

Every week, we run lots of information about classes and lectures, but they are more than that. Each one is a notice about activities with other folks, whether it is about playing bingo (for fun, not profit) or raising money for the Wando High theater students by getting a bunch of musicians together to rock Awendaw Green. That's happening Feb. 18. Firefly Records and Johnny Dogs are sponsoring the event to help send students to their statewide competition.

Or maybe you want to just hear something interesting, such as the recent musical lecture that Dr. Nicholas Butler, musicologist and manager of the Charleston Archives at the Charleston County Library, gave at the Susannah Smith Elliott DAR Chapter meeting in Summerville.

He played "The Turk's March" on the fife, a tune that was played by black musicians when Charleston surrendered to the British on March 12, 1780.

So even if your New Year's resolutions have buried themselves on the back of your desk, there are still lots of things to do in our area.

Who knows, you might, like me, discover a friendship with someone you went to high school with. We never knew 40 years ago that we had so much in common.

Reach Stephanie Harvin at 937-5557 or sharvin@postandcourier.com.