Carmen M. Ruiz commands her students with the authority of a drill sergeant.
"Work it!" she shouts over the Latin music blasting from speakers. "Bend over and touch your ankles!"
Six women find the beat, and on command, bend. They hoist their glutes to the ceiling and sway their hips to the music.
Ruiz wears a cherry-red shirt and mustard-yellow sweatpants. The front of the shirt says, “Caribbean Aerobics.” The back reads ZUMBA in big black letters. Her auburn hair is pulled into a bun and covered with a blue bandana.
When the song stops, one student sighs loudly, mopping the sweat from her forehead with a gray towel.
"It ain't 7:15 yet? Jesus!" she says.
Her heart rate is up, she's tired, but her feet continue to march in place.
Ruiz doesn’t allow them to stop or sit down. There is no stopping or sitting down in Zumba.
Every Tuesday and Thursday evening, Ruiz, 57, leads a class of women looking to shake, swivel and salsa their way into shape through Zumba, a mix of Caribbean, African and Latin dance moves. The class meets at Bay Vista Recreation Center located between the Pinellas Point and Coquina Key neighborhoods in St. Petersburg, Fla.
By day Ruiz, 57, is a hospice nurse, tending to the last needs of dying patients and their families.
By night, in her Zumba class, she tends to her dance clients, helping them find health and joy through music and exercise.
“You step from one obligation to another that isn’t really an obligation,” she says. “You are giving of yourself body, mind and soul.”
A New York native, Ruiz and her husband moved to St. Petersburg in the early 1970s. She eventually divorced. As a single mother raising two young sons, Ruiz worked for a time as a secretary, then put herself through nursing school. She earned her RN degree in 1980.
She spent of her nursing career at Bayfront Medical Center and also occasionally worked as a transport nurse, accompanying foreign patients en route to hospitals in their home countries. Her work gave Ruiz a view of things most people never wish to see: gruesome accident wounds, head injuries and dead bodies.
“You become kind of numb to it,” she says. “There are some cases that touch you. There are some you walk away and feel nothing. Others, you say, ‘Wow’ — if that were me, what would I do?”
In June, Ruiz left the hospital and joined The Hospice of the Florida Suncoast as a hospice nurse. She visits patients at their homes or at hospitals and nursing homes. She checks their need for supplies like bedpans and rolling beds. She sits with the patients when family members caring for them need to run errands.
“When the patient is alert, they tell you what their life was like,” she says. “It’s nice to listen to an older person talk about their life.”
Facing death is a daily reality of her job. It’s the one guarantee we all have, she says.
“I just spoke with this little lady who said, ‘I’m ready to close the curtains,’ ” Ruiz says. “It’s the family and friends that have the hard time letting go.”
After her first son was born in 1971, Ruiz would wake up early to exercise with fitness guru Jack LaLanne on TV. She’d always been into sports, fitness and dancing. In 1990, she trained to become certified to teach her first aerobics class. She started teaching the basics, then began to incorporate Caribbean dance steps with small hand weights.
She first heard of Zumba in 2005. Ruiz, who has always enjoyed salsa, merengue and tango dancing, took to the fast-paced, rhythmic movements. She began teaching the class at Bay Vista in 2006 while still working at the hospital as a recovery room nurse.
Zumba instructors use fast-paced, salsa-infused music to teach students movements that work the body from head to toe. The music is a mix of Caribbean, Latin and hip-hop.
“It could be called global aerobics,” Ruiz laughs. “The only thing I don’t do is polka.”
“Move your butt; shake that right hip!” Ruiz shouts above the music.
As the class continues, Ruiz’s shirt dampens with sweat. She keeps her eyes locked on the mirrors in front of her, monitoring her student’s movements.
One of her students, Tangerae Brown, says she feels sexy when she does Zumba. Brown, 37, started attending Ruiz’s class in June after her doctor diagnosed her with borderline diabetes.
“I need this peace of mind. I need to get out of the house. I need to exercise,” Brown says. “It’s not a want. It’s a need.
“Carmen is really nice and she says to go at your own pace until you feel comfortable.”
Leah Clendening, 66, has attended the weekly Zumba sessions since the first class. She enjoys Latin culture as well as the fitness aspects of the class. “We love Latin music and love to dance, so this is a way to do it if you don’t have a partner,” she says. “This keeps us young, keeps us active.”
At the end of class, the students clap, congratulating themselves on a job well done. They gather their gear and promise Ruiz they will be back for the next session.
Ruiz wipes the sweat from her face with a towel. It’s been a long day.