Imagine teaching three water-aerobics classes a week, participating in line dancing classes, and helping care for a toddler. Sounds like a full plate?
Now imagine doing it all at age 84.
That’s precisely what neighborhood senior Florence Rotondo does every week. And you thought your schedule was full!
The 16-month-old is Rotondo’s fifth great-grandchild. And while her line dancing skills are second to none, her real claim to fame comes with her position as a Waterworks instructor at the Central YWCA.
Most of Rotondo’s students are half her age – a statistic they say doesn’t matter when she’s pushing them to work hard in class. Longtime student Carol Lyons describes Rotondo as an upbeat, fun instructor who regales her students with amusing personal anecdotes.
“Her stories always keep us going,” Lyons says. “She is a real motivator.”
Rotondo was among the pioneers of the aquatic exercise movement in the Dallas area. While participating in a Jazzercise class at the Lake Highlands North Recreation Center in 1979, she learned about a new water aerobics class that was forming. She signed up and fell in love with this form of exercise, eventually taking over as instructor for the course.
“Before I took the class at Lake Highlands North, I had no idea of the power of this wet stuff,” Rotondo says. “Water exercise provides unbelievable therpeutic benefits for your whole body, both inside and out.”
“There’s no stress or strain on your joints, and the continual resistance of the water gives you a free massage!”
Rotondo has been a neighborhood resident for 50 years. Before retiring, she spent 25 years as a church librarian and 13 years as director of the Northridge Presbyterian Church Preschool.
She currently teaches the “Waterworks Deep and Shallow” class Monday and Wednesday evenings at the Central YWCA on Ross, where she has taught for 10 years.
Joh Eoff, programs director at the Central YWCA, says he is impressed by Rotondo’s level of personal commitment to aquatic exercise.
“Being a newly founded YWCA program not yet fully recognized,” Eoff says, “Florence personally raised funds for the equipment so desperately needed at the time.”
In addition to this class, Rotondo volunteers her time teaching a class of seniors at Vickery Towers, Belmont and Greenville.
For information about the “Waterworks Deep and Shallow” class, contact the Central YWCA at 214-826-9922.
