May 2017 – hannah ananas

tuesday – tuesday – tuesday

Last night, I went to a dance social in Tokyo. It was mostly friends and acquaintances, though plenty of other people I hadn’t known before the social last night. However, they were all adults, which makes the following scenario worth telling (in my opinion, anyway). As an important matter, know that I wore days-of-the-week underwear yesterday. And, yes, they were for the correct current day of the week.

At the social, I happened to be wearing a pair of blue linen pants with a drawstring. As such, they consistently slipped ever so slightly downward as I danced. With my shirt being longer than the waistband of my pants, that normally would be no biggie. However, seeing as this was west coast swing dancing, that means that my shirt regularly would get twisted or bunched up a bit, rising above the waist band of my pants for a couple or few seconds here and there.

Now, I normally am not opposed to such little glimpses of my midriff as my shirt-pants combination were displaying. However, since my pants kept slipping downward, little by little, in combination with the shirt going upward now and then, this meant that the waistband of my underwear was also showing on a regular basis as I danced. I guess I am not really opposed to this either, as they are nothing sultry, but I guess it is a bit of a social taboo when in certain company. I digress…

I chuckled when I first noticed my peeping underwear waistband, because, do recall, I was wearing days-of-the-week underwear last night. “See?” I thought, “I am just so dedicated to my job, that I am even teaching English after hours!” For, every time my shirt went up, “Tuesday” was visible in clear block letters all the way around my hips.

I shared this thought with a few friends, and we all had a good laugh at the silliness of the situation – that I not only was wearing days-of-the-week underwear, but was unintentionally showing them off to everyone, and found a cute little joke around its happening. One girlfriend commented, that it was a mighty fine and creative way to teach high schoolers English, removing clothing and showing the English off on parts of the body. I replied how I could only imagine how much the boys would love learning English. She then said that even she would be interested in seeing that lesson happen. After all, who could resist such a unique lesson, boy or girl, man, woman, or +? I know I’d want to see it, if something like that happened, because that’s just too ridiculous to pass up. 😛

Post-a-day 2017

Coincidental Acquaintances filling the Heart

I almost missed my trains home tonight, because I didn’t want to leave the people with whom I was. I had only just met the majority of them tonight, and only passively, but I loved being with them. You know the people who just seem to fill your heart, and make you wish for nothing but, perhaps, more time with them, for you are fully content in their presence? That was my experience tonight.

I met these people at the dance event/social just a few hours ago, and only barely had the chance to talk with them during the social. And yet, here I am, genuinely concerned (well, I was for a bit, anyway) that I might not make it home tonight, for I couldn’t seem to draw myself away from their presence as we stood outside the train station, just talking. Well, we weren’t just talking, of course, but talking and laughing and joking and expressing joy and love with one another. And that’s exactly the point, exactly the reason I felt myself magnetized to the little group of people who, except for the one couple, had only just met one another tonight.

It was beautiful, and has not left me wanting. For now, for tonight, I am whole and complete, and utterly content, for I belonged with an ease I felt like I had forgotten, I was loved without hesitation, and my love was fully accepted. 🙂

❤ people who love
Post-a-day 2017

Serendipitous Unknowing

Sometimes, I just have no idea where I am standing in the world. Tonight, just now, actually, I went outside to see if I could see Cassiopeia, the constellation. I just finished the film Serendipity, and realized that I had never looked up Cassiopeia, up above, I mean. So I checked how it looks, and then went outside to find it. After giving up once, and going back inside, I decided to look it up online again, though still briefly, and went back outside. I felt almost desperate as I discovered that I likely would not be able to identify the constellation tonight. I accepted my fate easily and with a respectable sense of calm. However, there was a certain sense within me that was noticed deep within, a feeling of desperation, though I couldn’t say for what. I headed back down the little street and turned the corner to my apartment, longing to fall-crawl into bed, snuggle up, and cry with my stuffed animals and blankets holding me closely and lovingly.

Walking up the stairs in my socks, sandals, and James P. “Sulley” Sullivan onesie, I asked myself and the world at large what I am resisting. What is my life trying to show me right now, that I’m not seeing? What am I afraid to accept and take on, that the world is setting forth for me? What am I avoiding? What is the question to ask right now?

I don’t know.

I’m going to find Cassiopeia, though, even though it isn’t happening tonight. That is one thing I do know, and I thank God for that, in addition to my life, at the very least.

Post-a-day 2017

“I want so much more…”

Tonight, I saw in the cinema the newest version of “Beauty and the Beast”, the one with Emma Watson. I have little I want to express about the movie itself here; I instead have a sentiment to share, which a particular scene evoked from within me.

As Belle made her hike up the hill, taking in the expanse of lands around her little town, I found myself crying as I mentally sang along with her words. It simultaneously shocked me and seemed only natural. Why on Earth would I be crying, when it isn’t even the sappy or sad parts of the film yet? However, I fully understood my tears the second after I noticed them.

I can’t help but to feel that, with this almost-constant sense of anticipation and longing in my life, I know just how she feels, and down to the depths of my heart. For whatever reason, I find a huge truth for my own life, expressed oddly perfectly through her words.

I want adventure in the great wide somewhere.
I want it more than I can tell.
And for once it might be grand
To have someone understand:
I want so much more than they’ve got planned.

Post-a-day 2017

Trading Good for Great

One of the hardest things for me in life is giving up something good. And I don’t mean just giving it up, in any sense. I think I really mean giving up something good, when the only purpose is to make space for something better. ‘What I already have is wonderful. Why do I want to give it up, and risk having nothing in the end?’ For whatever reason, I believe that a sort of fairy tale is in progress in my life. Anything is possible, and I am determined to have an amazing life. Perhaps I have a separate sense for this kind of feeling, and perhaps I’m just filled with a sort of wishful thinking, likely inspired by film and novels. (Pride and Prejudice is one of my favorite books, after all.) I don’t know. I do know, however, that every time I have let go of something that has been “good” or less, something better has just shown up for me. The newer, better something is almost effortless in having it become part of my life. The hard part is letting go of the former, not-as-good something.

For clarity, imagine, well I don’t know right now. I can’t seem to think of anything specific from my life right now. (I am rather exhausted from having stayed up late for a friend who needed a place to stay last night, and then ending up chatting together, catching up, until way into the morning hours of nighttime. It was great finally seeing this particular friend again, but it has left me wiped tonight!) Well, let’s talk generally, then, on a common matter. Just watched Sleepless in Seattle again. If she had stayed with her wonderful Walter, life would have been nice; she could have gotten on just finely with her Walter for the rest of her days. But, she had a sense of there being something more, something even better than her Walter out there for her. By letting go of her Walter, she created the space in her life for Sam. And, frankly, it seems Annie and Sam were MFEO (made for each other), just as the young children had somewhat declared. So, Annie let go of something good, and something spectacular arrived in the space created by Walter’s departure from Annie.

Does that make better sense? I think it’s still iffy on my description tonight, but we’ll let it stand for now, so I can go to sleep. 😛

Anyway, I’m terrified to let go of what I know is not the best for me, but that is currently “good” and “decent” for me in my life. Absolutely terrified. And I know that I must first let go of it, in order to create the space for something amazing to come along. Deep breath, Hannah. Deep breath. 🙂

Post-a-day 2017

Worldwide Shipping

Tomorrow, my life is scheduled to alter. A friend is coming over late morning, we’ll run a couple or few errands together, taking good advantage of her car’s being here, and then our plan is to pack up everything I no longer need for my daily life, but that I want to keep in my life once I have moved back to the US. To me, it is a sort of marker for the official beginning of the end; an end to which I look forward with great enthusiasm.

There are certainly many, many…, and let’s throw in another many things and people that I will miss from here. However, so much of my life here consists of my job, which I very much dislike as a whole, and my solo city and apartment, of which I am not a fan (I really dislike being solo in life. I’m fine with a solo apartment, so long as I have regular interaction (like daily, often multiple times a day) with people I love and who love me. That, however, is not at all the case in my life here.). Therefore, I am greatly looking forward to the end of this bit of my life.

In an odd way, I have felt as though I have taken a year out of my life. As opposed to this having been a year of my life, it feels like a year out of my life, as though we could hit pause and go on brief tangents in life. (Perhaps it’s more like changing the channel briefly, always knowing that the real show is on the original channel. Something like that.)

So, I find myself delighted to be packing up tomorrow, getting ready to move forward. It allows me to let go of the material objects, as well as the concern of how to move them into the next part/s of my life (Think plane trips with insane amounts of baggage – this is about ten times worse than that.), and focus my attention and mental space on the people and world around me that I want to love as much as possible while I am here. It has been difficult for me to love at times while being here, and that, in and of itself, has been a powerful lesson for me in my life – learning to love when all I want to do is throw a fit at how terrible and unloving a situation is to me. I want to do what I can to love this world around me, while I have the chance, and I know that tomorrow is a good step in having that happen.

And I’m terrified. In a wonderful way, of course.

Post-a-day 2017

Sofa Buddies

What is it about sofas that makes them such a comfort? I mean this question in a specific sense, though I am not actually looking for any specific answer. Many a time, growing up, I found myself frightened in my bedroom, and so went down/out to the sofa in the living room to attempt to fall back asleep (usually passing out somewhat promptly each time). Even nowadays, there is still something so comforting about the sofa, I regularly have a sort of desire to snuggle down and fall asleep on it, instead of getting up and going into my bedroom to fall asleep.

Perhaps is it the residual psychological and emotional link between the sofa and getting to watch cartoons and movies, and being snuggled by the dogs or my siblings or parent, and late-night movies when we didn’t have to get up early the next day, and enjoying summer vacation. Perhaps it is the foot rubs my dad and I would exchange as we watched tv together in the evenings. Perhaps it is because we always seemed to have amazing blankets to use on the couch. Perhaps it is none of the aforementioned, and perhaps it is all of it, and perhaps even more still. I don’t know what it is that makes sofas such a comforting, cozy, happy place for me. But there is something about them, I just love hanging on the sofa, which is why I am now writing about it, as I lounge on my own sofa bed and notice my feelings of not wanting to get up and go get in my own real bed to go to sleep (although I am actually quite tired). 🙂
Post-a-day 2017

Magic in our pockets

Tonight, I have dance class (at long last). But that is not exactly the point… merely a piece of the mix. I am on my way to dance class now, writing this, as I listen to the lady’s voice coming through the hidden speakers on the train, announcing clearly, “Please off your seat to those who may need it,” at which I inwardly chuckle/cringe each time.

Before I left home for class, however, I was baking cake cookies, while watching a film. The film was “Kate & Leopold”, and it was showing on a laptop near me at my convenience. It was well past time to leave, but the film was not quite finished. However, I had finally finished my cake cookies, and so had no real excuse to delay my departure – the film could pause and wait just as easily as it could continue playing… Perhaps even more easily, as it required no power source from my apartment to do that. Though, that is not the point here.

So, I paused the movie, once I saw that it had a good ten minutes remaining in it, and it therefore would not finish in the time it took me to go to the bathroom and put on my socks. Now, I know how the movie ends. That, too, is not the point. The point, my dear readers is this: I didn’t have to stop watching the film, despite my then immediate departure.

How crazy a world is this one in which we now live, where I don’t have to stop watching the film that is at home, when I leave my home?

I could have easily pulled up Netflix on my phone, just as easily as I checked the time when I was slumbering down the stairs outside – which was, indeed, how Inhad even had the idea – , and immediately resumed the film where I had paused it. Just by opening the website (or app if I’d bothered to download it), I could have simply clicked the play button and continued my film as I was heading to the train station.

It seems so simple and normal and standard, because people do this all the time. I see people watching TV shows and movies almost every time I am on the train. And yet, having experienced this particular situation tonight, I suddenly see how bizarre and futuristic a concept this is. A movie can travel with me in my pocket, even if ten seconds ago, it was on a huge TV screen or a computer or wherever. It’s like shapeshifting or magic, and we’re all carrying it around with us, as though it’s a cup of coffee or a slice of bread. Or an apple. Literally, I guess. (Though I’d definitely intended that one to be a reference to its connection with the magic of physics.)
Post-a-day 2017

Being my own parent?

Now that I’m on my own and in charge of my own schedule, I find that I regularly wish I had someone to be a sort of accountability buddy. I’m essentially being the parent and the non-compliant, sneaky child all at once. I tell myself that I really need to go to bed by 9:30 each night, and around 11:45, I start to be all concerned and upset about having not followed my desired bedtime. When I had an enforcer (e.g. Parents or siblings), it was much easier actually to get a good night’s sleep than it is now. No matter what the excuse back then, it almost never mattered – I went to bed anyway. Nowadays, I don’t even have to try to convince myself to stay up. I’m just so distracted by whatever it is, I don’t even seem to realize that an hour has passed, and I’m still not even close to ready for bed.

So, this leaves me either wishing for an accountability partner for my sleep, or, essentially, a parent or babysitter, who can make me go to bed on time.

To be fair, though, when I actually set a rule for myself, I follow it. For example, I have just this week decreed that I need to be finished with computer and tech stuff by 9pm each night. This includes writing for this weblog. Hopefully, that means I’ll start getting to work on it much earlier in the evening or day each day, giving myself more time to have it meet my own standards again. That’d be nice, hmm? (I think so, anyway.). Anyway, it’s two ’til, so I’m off! Goodnight and good day, folks! ❤
Post-a-day 2017

Math class in Japanese

Have you ever tried to do math in a written language you don’t know? I have. Forget about the part where you might have to wrack your brain, in order to recall certain mathematical formulas and rules from a decade or three ago. What good does a formula do you, when you understand neither the givens nor the question? Plus, how do you even find a formula, without knowing what you want to do (like what is being asked of you)?

I think we tend to be consice with our words in math problems in English a good amount of the time. Sure, we have word problems, but the non-word problens usually are quite short on wordage. For example, the following:

Find the following:
x = __ y – __ ∠A – __ lineAB – __
Given x = √7, find y.
Solve for b.

That sort of thing. In Japanese, however, I’ve been unable to solve the problems, simply due to the fact that I can’t figure out what the problems are! Usually, as soon as someone shows me what’s being asked on these Japanese math problems, I know the math to solve it. However, the sheer magnitude (is that applicable here?) of words in the math problems throws me entirely to the sharks. I’m usually quick with math, but I’ve never been slower than I am now with Japanese math. Aargh! 😛 Haha 😀

P.S. Just for reference, do recall that I am not actually in school as a student, but am a teacher. And yes, it was normal for me as a teacher back in the US to join math classes. Because I love it, really, and I can’t imagine life being quite so exciting as it is when I get to do fun math. 😛 I’m a total nerd, I am aware. 😀

Give it a go! These are even a bit easier than what I had in class. 😉

Post-a-day 2017