friends – Page 65 – hannah ananas

Workouts, Teachers, Tears, & Careers

I honestly don’t know how to describe today. It was good and bad and wonderful and horrible and surprising and loads of other stuff, too. I’m not sure there’re real words for it, even. And not in a bad way, of course. Just in an indescribable way. You know?

I guess the best way to describe it is by saying that today was filled with love.

I found out on Tuesday, that one of the teachers at my gym was leaving at the end of the month (i.e. this Friday). I was rather distraught upon learning the news. However, I wasn’t too surprised about it – she had always seemed like a superstar in our kind of gym. We are casual, everyday family, exercising together and having fun. She is one of the most fit, beautiful, sexy women I have ever known. And her enthusiasm and real-ness are both top notch.

She has this one class that is insanely difficult, though totally simple, and today was the last time that she she would be teaching it. Afterward, she kind got a little red-eyed after one lady hugged her after our high fives (she always starts and ends that particular class with enthusiastic hang tens). When she was saying a thank-you to everyone, I started to redden around the eyes, too. And, when she started to talk to me while I was finishing putting away my weights and bands, I just went full-out crying, and we hugged multiple times, both crying and saying thank you (in Japanese, of course) to each other.

The gym won’t and can’t be the same without her, though I know it will still be good. In the midst of my depression, this gym, and especially this teacher’s classes, were the main thing that started me on my road to becoming myself again, and they now have been a fixture in my life. I have never before scheduled activities around a gym schedule, nor preferred to spend hours at the gym on my own instead of, well, doing anything else. The gym was my life for a while, and it was what helped me to be healthy enough to find more to be part of my life. And, now that this teacher and her classes are going to be gone, I can now spend more time doing those other things that I want to be part of my life (because, up to now, I have tended to cancel other activities when they coincided with her classes, because I so loved her classes).

Plus, at some point, I am going to be leaving myself, so I needn’t be too upset at her leaving first. But that isn’t exactly the point. Tangent-ish. Anyway…

The group gave her flowers, and we took a group photo with her, and various folks were crying (or perhaps it was just she and I), and it was super sweet.

When I asked for the group photo, I got to find out that she is going to be studying instead now – she wants to study physical training and English, and working here keeps her from having the time to do that. So she’s giving up one love for a greater one. And, when she asked about when I’m leaving Japan, she was all surprised and distraught that it’s so soon (four-ish months), but was really excited for my own plans for what’s next in my life. She could relate to how I felt about wanting to pursue the things most important to me, even if they seem a bit abnormal or crazy.

Then we took a few selfies together, at her request, even finding better lighting to make sure they were good ones, and then we hugged some more before a final goodbye. She didn’t ask for solo pictures with anyone else – just the one big group picture.

All in all, it was awesome. And, possibly the best part, is how much love I felt. From me to her and from her to me, there was so much love. I don’t know lots of Japanese (though I understand a good amount), so I don’t typically start much chit-chat with people, simply because I don’t have the words. I always would find ways to talk with her – often using English, which often resulted in a fun befuddlement on both sides of the conversation. She was always hesitant to use English herself, but she usually understood me, and I usually could understand her, so it worked. However, her hesitation with English made me wonder if it were the English or the Hannah that had her be hesitant. I always suspected it to be the English, but it wasn’t until today that I really discovered that for sure. She loves me and I love her. And I believe I have never cried over any kind of teacher the way I cried over her today after our last class with her.
Post-a-day 2017

The Fear of Openness and Intimacy

It is often terrifying to be open with people regarding very intimate things. Usually, though, the result of the openness is absolutely wonderful, often beyond expectations.

Tonight, after months of nervous waiting and somewhat avoidance, I finally asked a friend about something that had been driving me absolutely crazy, – it even played a decent role in my depression – and the resulting conversation was beautiful. Rather than the worst happening, and losing the foundations on which our friendship stood, as I had somehow feared, it feels now as though we are closer than ever, and ready for most any terrain (as opposed to just being on steady ground, where any change in the land would send everything rocking to a tumble and crumble). And, at long last, I am free of that dragging, straining haul of thoughts that had hassled me for so long. I have a headache, and I feel like I might have a fever, and yet I am in an easy happiness as I am going to bed right now. Life is sometimes terrifying, and that’s okay. Sometimes it just makes the next bit even better for the struggle it took to arrive there. So is tonight. 🙂
Post-a-day 2017

Driving Lesson

Today, I had a driving lesson. Though it wasn’t so much a driving lesson as it was my asking questions to a friend while he let me drive his car. Japan drives on the left, so I wanted to have a practice session before going off on my own on the roads. Not that I even have a car or anything, but I’m thinking about getting at least a scooter, to help with exploring better, as well as getting around to places with significantly increased ease.

Anyway, it was fun. It’s magical how our brains can so easily flip-flop the physics for us, allowing me to be on the opposite side of the car, yet still drive well and safely. Way cool. 🙂
Post-a-day 2017

Love-Hate relationships

Do you ever wonder about why we can be simultaneously angry at and totally in love with someone?

I certainly do.

A friend of mine is kind of a terrible long-distance friend. Actually, one of my best friends is rather bad at it, but we have been friends for so long, that it always works out wonderfully whenever we do get to talk and to see one another. But she’s not the point here. A newer friend is.

I so incredibly value my friendship with him, that it is hard not being in contact with one another. However, since he is such a terrible long-distance friend, we regularly have long periods of almost zero communication. These times result in my growing very angry, even furiously fed up with him. And yet, even in those moments of extreme anger, I am aware of how much I love him.

I suppose it makes sense, though, seeing has how the only reason I’m mad at his not being around is because I want him to be around (because I love him). However, I just find it somewhat crazy that I can so easily simultaneously experience both sides of the spectrum – complete love and utter anger – with one single person at a single given moment in time.

It just seems nuts, you know? While also being totally normal and everyday ‘duh, well, of course.’ 😛
Post-a-day 2017

The Ice Skating & Smelly Socks Affair

One day last winter (not the one that just ended yesterday, but the one from a year ago), my friend Stephanie and I went ice skating. It was an indoor rink at one of the shopping malls in Houston, and we were both quite excited for the ice skating. In a packed parking lot that seemed like it would never give us a place to park, we somehow landed a magical spot right by he entrance to the ice skating rink… and we hadn’t even known that that was where the rink even was within the mall.

So, we got our rental skates, left everything but our shoes in the car, and headed out into the ice. After an amazing time being scared and silly, gliding around on the ice, we returned our skates. However, upon doing so, we discovered that the skates had clearly not been very clean, as our socks smelled of something awful!

There was no way I was going to put those wretched socks in my shoes, but my feet smelled horrible now, too. So, what do we do? A Hannah plan.

We noticed a Target next door to the skating rink when we were coming in. So, in our socks, we ran across the cold parking lot to the Target. We bought a pack of socks to share, and found our way – this time indoors – back to the skating rink with its bathrooms.

We washed our feet in the sinks, one foot at a time, and carefully dried each one, before donning a new sock and putting on our own clean shoes. The floors in the bathroom weren’t so great, seeing as they were designed for people to use while still in wet ice skates, so this was a very special balancing act. Stephanie in particular struggled just to get her foot up in the sink. I’m not sure, but we might have been laughing the entire time, making it that much harder to balance.

Eventually, we had clean feet in clean new socks, inside our own (clean) shoes, and we put the dirty socks in the Target bag in Stephanie’s trunk, tied tight. I forget how she had worded it exactly, but Stephanie had said something to the effect of, ‘Hannah has the most insane ideas, and she makes me laugh.’ I definitely agreed with her, but couldn’t help but feel these sorts of things were somehow a normalcy for me. 😛
Post-a-day 2017

Yoga and Winter Blues

Right as I was heading through the rising action into the climax of a film I was watching before bed this evening, my best friend and I ended up texting one another over some e-mails and SNL (Saturday Night Live) sketches from earlier in the day, and, since we were already interacting, she invited me to do yoga with her. Naturally, I knew she meant from some online video, and not something that required me to leave my living room or put on real clothes, because, as you might already know (click here to know how you might already know), we are living in different countries (England and Japan). Since my life is totally normal and all, I had no hesitation in pausing the movie at 10pm to do a 30-minute yoga set for winter blues with my bestie.

We put up FaceTime on my laptop and her phone, so we could see one another and be together, and then we synchronized the youtube video on each of our computers (I then muted mine, having us both listening to her computer, but each watching on our own screens). It took us a bit to get started, as we went back and forth about whether or not to wear bras and pants (American pants, as we already had the British ones), but I finally gave up on trying to find either, and settled myself in front of the heater to keep my legs warm (since I wasn’t sitting underneath a super cozy blanket anymore). The only requirement was doing downward dog facing one another, so we wouldn’t get a face full of bums on our screens…. except that we still discussed and tested doing downward dog from facing away from one another (I put on a scarf as a sort of half-loincloth in the back), so as to establish that we could, in fact, look at one another during the pose, delighting in one another’s faces (despite the legs and bums also noticeably visible).

And so we did a wonderful little yoga set from this great girl in Austin, Texas (who happens to have a strong resemblance to a friend of ours from high school). We chuckled. I made all sorts of silly noises (thanks to my It is freakin’ cold here, how on Earth do people function like at all in this country in wintertime lack of outdoorsiness (and thereby exercise) these past two-ish months). And we never really flashed one another. (Though downward dog is quite funny when your own shirt is loose, and shivs down (up?) over your eyes as your put your head downward.) And it was great. Totally simple. Totally normal (for us, anyway, though I’m not sure we’ve ever done this together before). Totally great.

I love best friends. I love being naturally silly. I love yoga. I love my best friend. I love warm weather.

And I love that we’re still on FaceTime with one another, though I’m busy writing and she’s busy eating lunch and reading, and we aren’t even talking to one another right now – we’re just hanging out together, and I love it.

P.S. In case you, too, want to beat the winter blues (I really do love the music kind, though), here’s the video we used. Take special care to note her various comments throughout the set, as well as the dog that shows up in the final couple seconds of the video.

Post-a-day 2017

#yogawithadrienne #winterblues

Beer & Cigarettes

Chatting with an acquaintance recently, I sort of weasled some interesting information out of him. The weasling wasn’t exactly intentional, – I was genuinely just curious – and it was more that he opened up after I shared information about my family and friends, as well as the general population in the US. But it was still some info that he was obviously super-hesitant to share.

It all came from our chit-chat about nothing special, and our never-ending back-and-forth about his smoking. We both agree that smoking is something terrible, both for individuals and the world at large. And we both agree that he is 100% addicted, and doesn’t really feel like he’ll fall to bits in his early- to mid-forties. So we occasionally have little goofy bits of conversation, which leave us both tickled and chuckling, usually as he goes off to smoke a cigarette.

A recent little anecdote was when he asked how I was doing, since he knew I’d been sick. I commented that I was doing alright, but was tired and had a bit of a cough still.
“Oh, me, too,” he said, accompanied with a coughing gesture.
“Oh, you’ve been sick, too?!” I express, concerned.
“No… Because I smoke.”
We both laughed. And coughed, actually.

And so goes our acquaintanceship, for the most part.

Recently, however, as we were chatting about the browning of his teeth, and that it does not match the obvious effort he puts into his daily physical appearance, I happened to ask him when he even started smoking. He smiled, and got real quiet for a minute, and I wondered if he was figuring out what to say.

“Twenty,” he finally said.
I raised my eyebrows.
“When I was twenty,” he repeated.
“Really?” I declared with pure doubt. (Think SNL’s “Really” skit from Weekend Update.)

He then reminded me unnecessarily that 20 is the age in Japan for smoking, I asserted my knowledge of the fact, and we moved on. I talked about how I remember my brother discussing his secret first cigarette, shared with siblings in the backyard as kiddos. I described the general standard for kids in the US with their first cigarettes and first drinks of alcohol, and how everything pretty much seems to happen around high school.

Eventually, this acquaintance, with a lowered voice, suddenly had a new story. No longer was he the follow-every-rule individual he initially (albeit hesitantly) declared himself to be. He was, in fact, just like all the kids back home. First drinks (beer) were at 16, and the first cigarette was not long afterward.

Now, there are two main things I pulled from this conversation. 1) I wonder if this is standard for Japan, the way it is for the US. 2) Was this bit of honesty a step towards our becoming friends, instead of just remaining mere acquaintances?

I, of course, know the answer to neither of those inquiries. However, I have a mind to figure them out! Plus, I’m really glad he opened up to me with the truth of it all. Not that it’s necessarily any big deal, but with how closed off people have felt to me here, it was really refreshing to have some openness, and on something that seemed rather sensitive. (Okay, there’s a third things that came out o f the conversation: What is the Japanese viewpoint on breaking that law of ‘No one under 20’? How quiet he grew and how unsure he was at first about answering my casual question really make me wonder…) 😀

Post-a-day 2017

Nonsense or not?

I sometimes feel like it’s just a whole lot of nonsense that I’m writing on here.* And I sometimes wonder about why I even bother, because it feels like a whole lot of nonsense. Yet, there is something that these writings do for me. Somehow, they open up something within me… perhaps it’s that they’re helping me to be the me that I not only truly am, but also want to be.

I don’t know, of course, as everything is just conjecture here. But there is something about this weblog that is huge for me, in an almost-tangible way. I can feel my breathing ease whenever I think about what this weblog is for me. It’s like me being me or something.

Anyway, it means a lot to me, even though I’m not quite sure what it all is, and even though it feels like a bunch of… well, nothings. Hmm… guess it really is a lot like Kathleen Kelly after all. 😛

Anyway, I just wanted to share that. So thanks for letting me write, world, and thanks, Nicole, for getting me on this weblog in the first place, and for holding me accountable and helping me win a plan with which I could work. 🙂
Post-a-day 2017

*If you’re seeing an odd parallel to Kathleen Kelly right now, too, bonus points to you. 🙂

Blessings

Today, I got even more medicine from this beautiful place and its beautiful people. And I didn’t even her close to tears, I had already been so healed by the previous day and a half… after months of depression, I’m not sure I could have been more relieved to discover this fact today. 🙂

Here’s to dancing and marriage and goofy, cross-cultural blunders and friends and fun drinks and silly things and the unplanned and lots and lots of colors and fresh fruit. 😀

Post-a-day 2017

Glee

Can I just have GLEE for my life? I mean it. Real life Glee Club.

Get together with friends, say once a week, and each prepare a little song to perform for the group. We can do themes, and even mashups, and maybe even just copy themes from the show at times (the ones we like, anyway).

I can only see this as a beautiful idea – it will help boost our confidence in performing in front of others (as well as being vulnerable in front of them), improve our musical skills, keep our creativity working in various ways (song selection, how specifically to perform the song in terms of instrumentation and speed and key, how to express ourselves through it, music (duh), etc.), bring more music into our lives, get a taste of music that our close friends like, get to know one another better, build beautiful bonds of trust between one another, and just plain bring joy to us all via music and welcoming camaraderie. It’s fabulous. And it’s totally terrifying. But I still want to do it! Yes, I do.

…I was thinking that I only wanted to start it once back home, when with friends with whom it is easy to communicate (my ideas in general, as well as just speaking the same language fluently), but I am now thinking that this might be something worth attempting here. Even if it is only with one friend (I have one in particular in mind for it), I think it would be a good step for me, both on the I want to go home level and the musical creativity and confidence level. : )

I’m not decided yet, but I think I want to do it with her. I know for sure that I am creating this club once back in the US. However, I’m leaning towards trying it out here first… Maybe I’ll be able to work out some kinks over these next six months, making it all the better in the Fall. 😀

Post-a-day 2017