hannah.ananas

Some sort of workout

We did some CrossFit tonight – or, as I sometimes like to call it, XFactor.

I also started menstruation today.

Not that I initiated it or anything, of course… it just began.

Usually, if I have any pain, it is right at the beginning of menstruation, Day one or Day two.

And, naturally, Day one this time around opted to give me a bit of pain.

Not much, but some pain, nonetheless.

Add to this my significantly lowered energy level – yes, this is totally normal for menstruation, in case anyone was unsure – and the high humidity and heat of this afternoon, and you can imagine a tough workout ahead of me when I arrived for the class.

So, the sprints for the first fifteen-ish minutes were tough, but I made it.

And the weight stuff was okay – I was just generally weaker and shorter-winded than usual.

But the plank stuff at the end – by the way, plank is usually no big deal for me at all – was one of the oddest experiences I’ve ever had with all of this.

You see, plank was fine… it was when we continued from regular into what light have been called a marching plank, where you put one arm stretched in the air in front of you at a time, while keeping your back flat, legs wide, and butt still low, that I hit a tiny bit of trauma…

For that part, followed by mountain climbers (still with the butt low), a lot of the lower abdomen ends up being used.

… a part which had not clicked for me ahead of time…

And so, as I struggled through my second round of the plank combo, and was on the marching plank things, I actually had to stop – something I’ve never done in plank work – for the extreme and intense pain that felt like my ovaries and uterus were about to explode forward out of my lower abdomen… I skipped over the rest of the marching things and just finished the mountain climbers before stopping, but it was still enough to leave me almost rather paralyzed when I sat back, crying.

I’ve never cried in the middle of a workout before, but I did it about three times today.

Yes, the one cry could have been enough, but I had to make sure I wasn’t just being lazy, wanting to get out of the hard work simply because it was hard, and using the excuse of my menstruation to get out of it… and it turned out that it was a combination.

So, I did a few of the marching things and all of the mountain climber things each round afterward, thereby still putting in the work, but not putting myself in unnecessary and useless pain.

I know I have lower energy at these times, and so I have aimed recently to allow for that (and rather successfully for the most part).

Tonight was just the first time I had to factor that into my goals of becoming more fit – I always push hard when my fitness is on the line these days, and it was surprisingly hard to scale back tonight, despite the fact that it was necessary and good for me to scale back.

Anyway, speaking of all of this, nature calls, so I’m off.

Sweet dreams, World at large.

Post-a-day 2019

R(ac)oonmate: Part II

Well, after some extreme readjusting with things – including people actually using their brains and taking over (which, oddly enough, actually meant doing what I had thought and said that I thought we needed to do all along and also just recently, with developments) – my housemate is now spending the night in a cage underneath the house…

The little buggar looked just oh-so-sad and pathetic, like a dog in trouble, when I first saw him down there this evening.

I had only been inside about an hour and a half, but that was enough… she hadn’t even eaten the can of sardines that had lured her yet, so I wonder if she had just been trapped when I found her.

Nonetheless, I talked with her a bit before I left, and then again when I came home just a bit ago, offering reassurance and well wishes, and explaining the rough plan of what is to come next.

Whether she can understand me or not, I feel she still deserves the care and concern, as a creature of God and all, you know?

He’s still one of us – even if he isn’t human, he’s on this planet to live life with us.

Fortunately, his cage is covered by the house and behind the protective fencing around the house bottom, so he ought to be safe down there tonight.

The guy who actually has been quite helpful with everything (who, by the way, doesn’t even work for the pest control company that has done such a terrible job of this all, but who offered to help, once he saw how things were going the other day while he was here to work on the A/C [also volunteered work]) will be here around four in the morning to take the next step.

Supposedly, if the guy opens up the house wiring and then the cage, the raccoon will do one of two things based on the situation.

1) It will leave the house immediately, because it is on its own.

2) It will rush back into the walls of the house, where it had had no food for days recently, instead of taking freedom, because it has babies up there.

If it is option number two, there will be these other little traps put out that are like super weak mouse traps with food on them, so that they will be annoying to the raccoon whenever she takes the food from them, but likely would be enough to convince her that this is not a safe place for her babies anymore, and so she then would go gather her babies and get out ASAP.

The down side of that is that she might go find someone else’s house for residence.

However, winter is over, so she doesn’t need the same protection, and most of the houses around me are so new and super protected that nothing could get into them, anyway.

Usually, he would be simply taken to this property someone has outside of Houston, but the possibility of babies complicates the matter, since raccoon moms somehow always find their way back to their babies, if the moms are moved.

So, we’ll just have to see how things go tomorrow…

Until that point, I wish blessings onto my housemate who is currently caged downstairs… may you have a beautiful life that is not in this house.

P.S. Please, take your fleas away when you go.

Post-a-day 2019

Speedboats and slow thoughts

I might have shared about this already, but I’ll share it again, because it’s on my mind…

I was thinking tonight about this boat thing.

(Well, actually, I was thinking about Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, and how I’m looking at reading it with a friend, so we can talk about it, but that this time I might do well to make a list of reasons why it’s good that I didn’t live in Pride and Prejudice times.

You see, I usually get lost happily in the story, such that I am sad when I finish it and just return to real life… it only ever takes me a couple or few days to read, because I end up doing little else once I start reading it.

And so, at the end of it all, I am covered with a sort of depressive feeling of my life being inadequate and/or uninteresting and I likely to be anything wonderful compared to the world of which I’d just been dreaming in Jane Austen’s book.

Anyway, so I was thinking about making a list of reasons, right?

I’d thought, ‘Oh, the whole bathing part makes me glad I don’t live there… that’s for sure,’ because I like being clean, and clean didn’t seem to be so precise a thing in those days, and smelly was all too common…

‘But then,’ I thought, ‘I couldn’t have ridden on speed boats or gone water skiing…, though I could have ridden on big boats between countries… like the Titanic!… only not the Titanic, because that was terrible, and, besides, it was much later in time, anyway…’

And that was then I thought of tonight’s topic renewal!)

Sophie Kinsella has a book where the main character has amnesia… when she watches her wedding and honeymoon DVD to help jog her memory, she sees herself beside her husband, who happens to be driving a speedboat.

She is absolutely delighted by the fact that her husband can drive a speedboat(!), and brings it up in her mind somewhat regularly, partly as a reminder that it it worth staying with him, despite the fact that she doesn’t remember him or seem to have a connection with him, and partly just as an adorable and silly reminder of how amazing her life has become (since she can last remember it), because, goodness, a man must be amazing if he can drive a speedboat(!), and it is even more amazing to be married to such a man.

Totally silly, I know, but that in no way changes the fact that I love it every time I think of it.

The main character does such a good job of convincing the reader of her belief in the fact that her husband’s skill is spectacular, that I found myself even thinking how amazing it would be, even dating someone who knows how to drive a speedboat.

‘Wow!’ I would think, ‘What could that be like, knowing, let alone dating or marrying, such a person?’

And this thinking continued for rather some time – even a couple or few years, I dare say – before something absolutely absurd hit me.

Growing up, two of my grandparents lived in a private community of lakes a ways North of Houston.

It would take us about two hours, door to door.

My uncle kept a ski boat there.

And we grew up kneeboarding and water skiing.

The damn broke terribly when I was supposed to start to learn to ski, but I eventually had the opportunity, when the damn and lake were restored.

And so, for the last couple years my grandparents lived there, I was the only child living at home, and so the only one who went to visit with my dad whenever he went up (the other went, too, but nowhere near as often).

My dad, therefore, taught me just about everything needed in terms of caring for and using the boat.

The ski boat… a speedboat…

Meaning, of course, that I not only know my dad as someone who can drive a speedboat, but that…, well,… I know… myself… you see…

Yeah… not too sure how I missed that one… for years.

😂😂😂

Not so impossible after all, to find someone who can drive a speedboat. 😛

Post-a-day 2019

Love one another?

I mentioned just the other night about my interaction with another person who maintains true eye contact while in conversation.

As I do the same thing, we often ended up with what felt like locked eyes, it lasted so much longer than it does with most people.

He also gave me a simple compliment in my hair… I don’t remember quite what it was he said, just that it was something to the effect of that my hair looks [insert positive word] long.

And I am both comfortable and clear that it was not flirting nor an expression of interest.

Yet, my mind keeps going back to it all.

I feel like it speaks strongly on our society that such attention is difficult to be seen as regular person-to-person love… such love is hardly regular these days.

And I don’t know if it used to be either – I just know that it isn’t regular now.

And I so want it to be.

…

I guess this is just a place for me to step up my own expression of person-to-person love in my little corner of the world…

You know?

Post-a-day 2019

“Compliments”

I’m part of a ladies group for my former job in Japan, and someone recently posted about how these old ladies always compliment her nostrils as being proportionate to her nose, and so she wonders if anyone else gets funny compliments from other Japanese people.

In a quick think through, I came up with this for my own experience:

I’m dirty blonde and blue-eyed. Students often complimented my ‘beautiful’ hair, asked to touch it and my arm hair, constantly complemented my ‘amazing’ and ‘beautiful’ ‘high nose’, and even, on occasion, discussed how ‘amazing’ my ‘soft breasts’* were (which, by the way, are proportionate to my body and are a small B cup for US sizing)…

Also, I once had a new student, who had just learned that my eyes are blue, specially request to see my eyes… he then gazed into them for a full thirty seconds, and then thanked me and walked away. 😂

*Because, naturally, they discovered that I was not wearing push-up or padded bras, and so, from the outside, my breasts were ‘soft’ and not ‘hard’, like their extremely padded bras…, which they explained to me by tapping loudly on their own surprisingly solid bras…

Oh, Japan…

I do miss you… ❤

Post-a-day 2019

Eye See You

How often in life do you consider length of eye contact?

It comes up somewhat often for me.

When I was little, my dad usually would ask me, just after our leaving a conversation with someone who had just been introduced to me, what color the person’s eyes were.

We both knew that it was his way of getting me to look the person in the eyes when meeting him or her, and we both actually enjoyed the fun little game that had become of the goal.

It was partly a distraction from what the person was saying, because I was focusing on noting and remembering the person’s eye color, but it had me be conscious of my eye contact, and encouraged me well to increase the amount.

As an adult, I now occasionally have what feel like eye contests with people, usually men, where we seem to be aiming to stare into the depths of one another’s soul, because we neither of us have the tendency to look away upon making eye contact.

In all the movies, it is the love scene, where the two lovers first make eye contact, and it is undeniably clear that they are meant to be together.

In my life, it mostly just has a message of good manners on both sides… I know, totally lame in comparison… but real life can be at times, especially without the specifically designed soundtrack and close-ups to go with it.

Anyway, when these – now, I don’t want to call them staring matches, because it isn’t like staring, but it isn’t quite a soul-searching look either… let’s go with gaze sessions – gaze sessions happen, I inevitably get the impression that the other person has a vested interested in what I am saying, and, therefore, in me, too.

And it is odd at times to understand that this young and happy and beautifully in-love, engaged man is uninterested in me in a romantic sense, despite the fact that it is always totally easy to understand quite well, because his interest in and attention to what I have to share is so strongly pronounced by his continued eye contact.

I usually have no thought of looking away from eye contact, because the other person present looks away long before I might consider it.

But, with these guys, neither of us is used to looking away before the other person does, and so we end up in this love-scene-like gaze session with one another, unsure what to do, and even unsure as to what we want to do – we’ve never had to consider looking away, because the other person always does, so we don’t even know if we, ourselves, want to look away.

And so, I always end up considering afterward how I want that kind of interest and invested attention from someone to partner with me in life… while these gaze sessions are not filled with romantic love but human love, I want ones with my future partner to be the same kind of expression, but with the romantic love present, too.

And then I consider how I might be making other people feel.

Sure, the gaze sharers are probably in a similar boat with me, realizing that I, like they do, look into people’s eyes when they talk with me, and they therefore think little else of it.

However, the people who are always looking away first, what are they always thinking about my eye contact?

Do I intimidate them?… Falsely occur as interested in dating them?… Freak them out?…etc.

And then, after several minutes of dwelling in the whole conversation, inevitably going onto weird tangents, I shake it all off (quite literally), and move on with my day/night and life.

Perhaps I’ll talk with someone about it, and if I bother people with my eye contact…, but it is unlikely that I would be willing to change it simply because people are scared to make eye contact, so I’m not in any rush.

Anyway… a final note: I love having these gaze sessions… whether the person has the vested interest in me or not, the romantic interest or not, matters not to me… what matters is that it feels like they love me on some level of humanity, and that is a wonderful feeling.

🙂

Post-a-day 2019

Some days

Some days, you want to go back to sleep, but you get up and go anyway, and you end up meeting just the right people (and rather unexpectedly).

And then, you want to nap, but you don’t, and you meet just the right people and you serve your community wonderfully in a much-needed way that no one else had been able to manage.

And then, you want to go to bed super early, but you don’t, because you’ve met just the right people.

And you discover that this mantra and meditation class is exactly where you needed to be, and things had to go this way today, in order for you to end up here as you did, being where you needed to be.

And you are still totally exhausted as you stumble up to bed, but you feel great through and through, because, all-in-all, it was a great day.

Yeah… some days…

Or maybe that’s just the case for me…

😛

Post-a-day 2019

Southern work

I have worked in private Catholic schools, and so prayer and Bible verses aren’t entirely uncommon here and there slash every morning.

However, any work that I have had outside of these private schools usually has little to do with religion or God.

Sometimes, a prayer or invocation will happen at some event or other, because, well, this is Texas – there is a certain wholesome Christian-ness toy the culture, and so prayer before their performances was entirely normal and acceptable for the theatre kids at my cousins’ public high school in small-town Texas.

Houston is a whole ‘nother story – big city here means a certain amount of he open Christianity is lost – we have people from all over the world living here, and I’m not so sure Christianity has the majority hold here, even.

Therefore, it is uncommon for me to have strongly open Christianity show up at work here – leave Houston and enter smaller towns, and it absolutely is the norm… but not here.

And so, it was extremely odd for me to have the Bible quotes to me as part of my internship training the other day.

Yes, it was totally relevant to what I was being taught, (the quote, I mean), but the assumed foundation of Christianity was never discussed and was somewhat irrelevant to the topic of discussion at the time.

However, it reminded me that, well, I am in Texas and I am in the South, and I’m working with someone who is not Houston…, so of course Christianity is the standard foundation for anyone around – being not-Christian is rather abnormal and extremely uncommon.

And something about it was beautiful to me – no one was aiming to convert or preach or anything like that at all… it was merely a matter of, ‘Well, it is our task, given even by God, to do this and that, so it brings everything full-circle,’ having it make even more sense that we would do something a specific way in this job I’m learning (which, recall, is not a job about religion, but about caring for animals).

In any city-like job, I think I would have been uneasy about the comment, concerned that it was a radical Christian trying to convert me from my sinful ways without even getting to know almost anything about me, let alone the fact that I am Catholic – yes, we have these radicals here from time to time, too – but in the somewhat countryside, working with horses, it was utterly normal and acceptable, and it even surprised me that I wasn’t expecting it.

I guess I was thinking more about how this is a ‘work situation’, which I relate to big city, as opposed to that it is a ‘country work situation’.

Because if I had put in the word ‘country’, I’d have been ready and waiting for all sorts of Bible and God tidbits to show up – countryside in the south equals God-fearing and God-loving brings who are grateful for the gifts that God has granted them in their lives… for men, it means Christian cowboys through and through.

Traditionally, anyway… I guess we’ll just have to see how things go for the future of our Southern countryside, but I do kind of like it – the kindness and love that is always there really is wonderful.

Anyway, that’s all I have to say about that right now.

Goodnight! 🙂

Post-a-day 2019

’S’wonderful (!)

Starlight, start bright

All you stars I don’t see tonight,

Take this wish I wish tonight –

I wish I may, I wish I might…

Have another day tomorrow that is as wonderful (or more) as today has been.

Thank you for the love, Universe, etc.

I might not be at par on the whole adulting thing, but I’m delighted with where I am on the whole pursuing passions and being self-expressed ones. (!!!)

❤

P.S. A selfie with the tubby guy at my internship

Post-a-day 2019

Aaaaahhhh, those blasted housemates!

Well, they’ve done it alright… the raccoons have overstayed their welcome.

It is official now that my poor bathroom, the place I must go in my home and cannot avoid, has fleas(!!!).

The raccoons have been living in the wall there the past couple weeks or so, and they seem to have brought fleas with them… the vent in the ceiling seems to be the culprit for how they’re getting into the actual bathroom from the walls.

Naturally, I despise it – nearly a year ago, I had a dreadful encounter with fleas while housesitting in this very street… any attempt at a repeat is to be obliterated, thank you very much.

And so, I suffer ever so slightly more tonight, acutely aware of the surprisingly marge number of freckles I have on my lower legs, ankles, and feet – indeed, I had no idea how many freckles I actually have down there (on my legs, of course, I mean).

I have covered my ankles and shins/calves with some essential oils I read about quickly online just now, ones that seem to be flea repellant and flea life-enders, and I have placed two bowls in the bathroom with soapy water and lit tea light candles… we shall see what the morning brings, but I have already dropped two or three in the bowls since I set them down just a short bit ago…

And yes, I am aware that that is not quite how the bowls and candles work, but, when they attack my ankles just because I’ve entered the room, I’m not apt to let them hang around on me…, and so I pinch and drop them directly into the soapy water of their future.

Ugh… you darned raccoons – I allow you a place to stay while you raise your babies, and you bring in this rubbish… how unkind of a houseguest this is.

Now, here I am in my room, panicking at every hair twinge and bit of air that brushes any part of my legs, worried at what it might be… I struggled falling back asleep this morning after I got the (I think) flea bite (hopefully) in the bathroom… I now worry at my being able to fall asleep at all tonight, or at least to sleep well and awake rested in the morning.

It seems sadly unlikely…

Darn raccoons… and, of course, fleas(!).

Post-a-day 2019