www.roanoke.com

George and Faith Overstreet have worked out three to four times a week at the gym, now known as Salem Fitness, ever since it was called the Cosmopolitan in the '50s. George, 91, fully participates in aerobics classes, and even though Faith, soon 89, has trouble standing and walking without a walker, she takes low-impact aerobics while seated.

George got the two taking exercise seriously when he was paralyzed from what he calls "a light stroke" around the age of 67. Doctors diagnosed him with a blockage of the brain stem and warned him that if the clot didn't pass within a day, he might not make it, Faith said. After he began recovering, doctors warned him that he might not regain all of his functions and reflexes.

"He was determined that he was going to walk and get everything back," she said. He joined the gym, and "he got me to join, too."

"I'd never taken exercise seriously until that," George said. "It's like, you're not ready to hang it up, you want to get up and do things ... Up to that point, I guess I was a spectator much more than a doer." He graduated from Jefferson High in 1936 and started in the Johnston-Carver furniture company doing clerical work soon after. His career went through buyouts by the Singer Company, and then Hooker Furniture. "That was back in the time when going to work required close attention to detail," he said.

They work out at Salem Fitness alongside folks they've known for years, including the owner Steve Garrett, whose time in the Air Force and as a physical trainer at the Roanoke Athletic Club led him to his purchase of the business over ten years ago. He teaches a few of the classes, including the low-impact aerobic course that takes the place of water aerobics in the new location, which got rave reviews from Faith.

"That's the best thing we ever decided to do was to take up exercising," Faith said. Even though it took them about a year to get into the groove at the outset, "I was pepped up and felt just like a million dollars ... I feel 100 percent better for the day," Faith said. She took up a job in her fifties after her two children grew up and had gone through school, and found herself tired out when she wanted to come home and cook dinner. Exercising definitely turned that around.

So what is the secret to longevity? George Overstreet doesn't have one particular answer, but he stays away from greasy foods and tries to do "everything in moderation." George's mother lived to be 97 years old, he said. But there might be another motivation for George to continue his three-time-a-week habit.

"I never thought about it too much until recently when the choir threw me a 90th birthday party," George said. He's been singing in his church choir, first Calvary Baptist in Roanoke through high school and then plus forty years, and now St. Paul's Episcopal in Salem for over 20 years.

"Singing is a physical thing. If you're not right physically, then you can't sing," George said. "That's one thing I really enjoy doing - hopefully I provide a service to others in doing it."