An era comes to an end at Moses Lake Jazzercise

MOSES LAKE — When Mary Graham first came to Moses Lake nearly 40 years ago, she had no intention of staying very long.

“I came on a one-year plan. My husband Mike got a job with East Wenatchee Valley Clinic,” she said. “I didn’t know much about Moses Lake. I grew up in Yakima, and Moses Lake did not have a good reputation.”

But then Graham, now 66, decided to start a business — Jazzercise of Moses Lake on the corner of Third Avenue and Holly Street — and very quickly Moses Lake became home.

“I would never leave this town. I love Moses Lake. And it has supported Jazzercise. It’s very hard to put together a business like this in a big city,” she said. “This is the perfect location for it.”

After 38 years of being a fitness instructor and running a business, however, Graham is handing off ownership of Jazzercise of Moses Lake to longtime instructor and associate Brittany Gies. Because it’s time, Graham said, not to move on, but to slow down a bit. Because her husband is getting ready to retire, and it’s hard to take any time off if you own a business, she said.

“Thirty-eight years is a long time, and I just felt in my heart it was the right time,” Graham said.

Jazzercise is a dance fitness franchise founded in San Diego in 1969. It combines dance with resistance training, kickboxing and even yoga to create a full-body aerobic workout, Graham said.

Prior to COVID-19, Jazzercise of Moses Lake had 10 instructors teaching 41 classes per week. However, due to the pandemic-related closures, Graham and Gies said they now have only five instructors teaching 19 classes a week, with an at-home online option because in-studio classes are currently limited to 10 people.

Graham said you don’t have to be a dancer to benefit from Jazzercise. In fact, Graham said she was trained as a speech and language pathologist when she fell in love with Jazzercise during her very first class.

“When I went to my first Jazzercise class, I went, ‘The heck with speech and language, I want to do this!’,” she said. “It has forever changed my life.”

Graham said that Jazzercise, and the studio itself, has become something akin to the center of her community. It’s where she’s found her closest friends, she said, and where she’s been able to raise money for breast cancer and lead warmup stretches for the Buddy Walk and help the local Soroptomist club.

It’s a sentiment Gies completely agrees with. And it’s why Graham considers her the “perfect, perfect” choice to become the new owner of Jazzercise of Moses Lake.

“I feel like it changed my life as well,” said Gies, 36. “The times when I had kids, I had to take a break from Jazzercise. I came right back when I could because there’s nothing like it. That’s why I want to make it work.”

While she isn’t going to change much as long as the COVID-19 restrictions apply, Gies said she would like to recruit more members and instructors and even eventually update the studio to make it “newer and flashier.”

“I’ve made so many friendships that feel like family, I can’t imagine if we had to close these doors,” Gies said. “As women, we wouldn’t have that connection anymore, and it would be devastating for all of us.”

Both Graham and Gies say the one thing they appreciated most about Jazzercise is that everyone is so welcoming and non-judgmental.

“We take all ages, all shapes and sizes, both men and women. We are not critical of people when they come in,” Graham said. “If you mess up, you mess up. Big deal. I do it all the time.”

“Oh my gosh, all of us instructors mess up all of the time, and then we call ourselves out and say, did you guys catch that?” Gies responded. “No judgment.”

As Gies takes the lead, Graham said, she’s still going to teach and lead workouts. Because she can’t imagine any other way of living.

“She doesn’t want me to leave,” she said, looking at Gies.

“So many people here love you, and if you left it would be devastating too,” Gies replied. “We’re so lucky to have her still.”

“And I’m lucky that she’s taking me on,” Graham said.

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at [email protected].