Tag: life

Biblical coincidence?

I’ve been reading from the Bible every night, in my effort to read the whole thing (Being raised Catholic, my family fit in well with the stereotype that Catholics really don’t read the Bible, but merely rely on hearing almost all of it through Mass attendance over the three-year plan the Catholic Church follows).

I’ve been in the part where Saul becomes King of the Israelites, and just last night hit the part where the Israelites seem like they’re about to have this big showdown with the Philistines… little did I recall that this upcoming showdown is actually where the story of David and Goliath takes place.

But I still haven’t read that part yet, so how have I come by this tiny enlightenment?

Checking my e-mail this morning, I found a digital audiobook from the library to be just this morning checked out to me (it had been on hold for quite some time, really [possibly months]).

And what book was this?

None other than David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell (if you don’t know his books, read them ASAP, or listen to the audiobooks, which are read by the author himself, ASAP)…., in the beginning of which, Malcolm Gladwell discusses the lead-in for the David and Goliath story, which, as I am listening, I suddenly recall, I have just been reading!

And so, with this fabulous Malcolm Gladwell approach to the story, I set myself with delight to the task of continuing on in my reading of the Bible.

I mean, what kind of perfect coincidence is that, anyway???

Bilingual Ballet

I found myself thinking of (and, of course, missing) my ballet class in Japan.

I was the tallest by a lot, and it was mostly older ladies (not old, but definitely older), and everyone was super sweet and happy and even a bit giddy every class.

And the teacher and I had an unwanted but accustomed distance-by-language-barrier, because my technical Japanese was utterly iffy, and her English possibly below that… that is, we had this distance until the night that we delightfully discovered that we both spoke French rather fluently… then we got on quite comfortably, and even more familiarly than I did with any of the others, because we could say so much to each other now.

I had always asked on occasion for the teacher to repeat something she’d said or done (in Japanese, of course), and I continued that…, but now I could and would ask for clarity at times when I still wasn’t certain what the goal or instruction was (if you’ve ever done ballet, you can understand how important it is to understand what muscles are doing what in a movement), and that part would be in French.

All in all, Monday nights at ballet class were always great, and I miss them now, especially with it getting cold outside (that was when I’d first started going to the classes).

Post-a-day 2018

It really isn’t personal

Sometimes a cousin just doesn’t greet you or bid you farewell, and won’t acknowledge your presence, despite your efforts to start conversation on anything at all, over the two days family is all gathered together, and you might as well have not been present, as far as that cousin’s behavior is concerned.

And then you find out that the same was the case for the receiving end of another family member, and likely would have been the case, too, for an absent family member if she had been present, and that this is regular behavior for this particular cousin, to ignore various members of the family (on the somewhat rare occasions she’s ever around, anyway).

And you realize that it’s totally okay if the cousin who ignores lots of family members isn’t really around much and ignores people whenever she is around – she clearly has enough of her own problems to deal with, if she can’t manage to talk to some awesome people (who just so happen to be related to her).

You know?

Kind of a ‘Her loss,’ kind of thing…

Post-a-day 2018

Moving

I’ll pack the bulk of it, and then do the million-gillion trips to the car and house, if you do the packing off all the miscellaneous items…

My brain just can’t handle it… simultaneously packing the last things in a hurry and arranging them in the most efficient positions… it just makes me go nuts whenever I have to do it, and I almost always take longer doing that than I spent on all the rest of the packing combined… packing the miscellaneous is just too stressy on my brain, because the logic of hurry does not win over the logic of pack efficiently.

It just doesn’t in my head. 😛

Suffice it to say that I am utterly drained, but still surviving due to the help offered by two glorious friends tonight from about nine to eleven… they were a Godsend, no doubt, and I would have suffered intensely in the head and body without them.

Still more to do to finish everything up, but those are just baby touches compared to what we accomplished tonight.

I thank you all, who blessed me today 🙂

Post-a-day 2018

Musicals

“Prince Siddhartha: The Musical”

Go see it – it’s wonderful.

It kind of felt like someone did what the makers of “Urinetown” did, how they took famous bits of other shows and included them in “Urinetown” (e.g. the “Evita” portrait in the mob, or the waving of the flag from “Les Misérables”), but just taking songs from famous musicals…. not that they stole anything – just that they were inspired strongly by those famous songs, especially in terms of the orchestra’s role and notes.

Nonetheless, it was a nice musical, and I kind of want the soundtrack now, so I can sing all the songs. 🙂

Post-a-day 2018

Moving

I am moving again, and I have even less of an official deadline this time as I did last time… and that’s making it difficult to pack up and actually move.

I’m also ever so slightly terrified at living all alone (mostly because of the neighborhood, and the fact that, on the odd occasion, something goes wrong in it, but also a bit because I like the feeling of someone being in the house with me, and knowing that we can help to take care of one another).

But I deep cleaned the carpet today, and so can move in furniture Monday (Ah! So soon!), and even some more boxes tomorrow (to the wooden floors part).

I guess I am scared…, and I’m doing it anyway, because this is my next step forward on this path I’m pursuing… and I’m delighted about that.

Post-a-day 2018

Today

Things about today:

  1. I finished another Malcolm Gladwell book, Outliers, and, naturally, feel like a total genius, totally inspired (as is the usual with his books).
  2. I cried multiple times and about various things, and I was okay with that.
  3. Someone told me that a someone is coming for me, sometime soon, within the next few years, and that that someone will love and respect and appreciate and value the beauty of a human being that I am and will show it in a way that I actually get to experience my immense value and beauty in the world.
  4. I want to believe him, and not other people, who say that perhaps I’ll never have a someone like that in my life (not in a negative way, but just a ‘there isn’t somebody for everybody, and you might be one of those everybodys with no somebody’ way).
  5. I was reminded that I desperately love languages, as well as teaching.
  6. I remembered, too, that I want to do more in my daily than just teach school classes.
  7. I wrote out all of this, before meditating/praying/playing music, and then going to sleep.

Post-a-day 2018

School… really?

I share tonight the end of an e-mail I sent this evening, because it seems to encompass all my current thoughts.

Hope you have a great week!  I’m struggling to write a long paper I don’t want to write for school, so I’ll go back to that now… it seems so far that 2/3 of my degree is on stuff I genuinely don’t care about and sometimes even dislike. :/

Peace
Hannah
Sent from my iPhone

I wanted something to do, and it seems I’ve gotten it.  I just wish I’d come up with something a little more to my liking for the long reports and papers, you know?  Oh, well… only two more semesters of the not-fun stuff, and then I get to the fun stuff (Woohoo!).

Post-a-day 2018

My future, felt

I’m starting to have a rather solid feeling about this idea of doing interviews… in some form or other, I want to interview people.

Perhaps it is journalistic or nerdy, or even fan-style of up-and-coming individuals in various realms of society interviews… perhaps it is Malcolm Gladwell blow-your-mind-every-single-time-while-leaving-you-feeling-like-a-now-genius book interviews style… perhaps something else entirely…

But it is interviews… I can finally feel that clearly enough to tell.

And I’m excited…

Post-a-day 2018

A famous professor

I received a letter from a man on whom we did a presentation in one of my classes… it was kind of surreal.

He has a whole, long Wikipedia page and everything, in addition to articles and all that jazz having been written about him over the years… plus, he, himself, wrote articles and books, and grew rather famous for them.

And he wrote and mailed me a letter. 🙂

Post-a-day 2018