perfection – hannah ananas

Unexpected feedback

I go to the workout today. We start with a warm-up, then move into strength. The strength work is squats, and then supersets of 60 seconds of plank and then 60 seconds of continuous Good Mornings.

I am doing the Good Mornings. My shirt was discarded a while ago. The coach (and gym owner) corrected my stance a bit at my first round of Good Mornings. Everyone is in different places around the gym, working on whatever part where they each are.

The coach comes walking up to me, doing his sideways stance, head dropped slightly, as though conspiratorially – his usual stance when speaking so that only the one person receives the information.

“I’m gonna say somethin‘…,” he begins. I am immediately nervous. What did I do wrong? Am I doing wrong? “…I don’t want you to take it the wrong way…”

Shit. I messed up somehow. What did I do wrong? Is it about my not wearing a shirt? Is it too much? Wait… other girls go shirtless, too…, though I can’t recall who at present…, but some do, I’m sure of it… maybe that I’m not pushing hard enough to have ditched the shirt, so it’s just too soon isn’t he workout to be in just the sports bra up top…?

“What??” I say more than ask, resignedly, looking at him sidelong, my face set in obvious trepidation.

He looks me in the eye, and then says, calmly and gently, and completely genuinely, “Your butt…” He makes a sign with his hand, pressing the first finger and thumb gently together, extending the others outward. It is the sign that is common for describing something, usually food, as ‘perfection’. He makes a corresponding shape with his lips, and tilts his head slightly to the side in the same motion.

My eyes gape. “REALLY???” I ask him, like a kid who’s just been told that Santa Claus wants to meet him.

He nods, reaffirming the hand motion and head tip.

Tears are almost instantly at my eyes. “You’re gonna make me cry!” I declare, eyes brimming.

He tells me not to cry, that I shouldn’t be upset – it’s something to be happy about. I tell him that I am extremely happy and that they are tears of joy and gratitude. He understands and believes my obvious honesty.

“I tell people, ‘I made that,’” he then says.

I laugh and immediately declare, “You did!… You totally did.”

After class, I thanked him for having shared with me. I have worked very hard, in many ways more than just physically these past two years. The past six months have been a near explosion of finally seeing and experiencing some of the goals I have had my entire life, regarding my physical fitness. Some of them were even just dreams, not goals. Yet they realized nonetheless. And, basically, all of it was made possible because of him and his training and coaching and support. Yes, I put forth the effort, but he provided the tools and guidance and support for almost all of the physical stuff, and a good chunk of the mental stuff, too. (He’s also the one who turned me on to Goggins, by the way.)

He also happens to be one of the fittest and, truly, sexiest people I have ever known. (No, no Eros attraction to worry about. I am merely describing his physical appearance here.) And I know how hard he works for that fitness for himself.

And he, of all people, complimented my buttocks. And not just any compliment, either. It was a You say it best, when you say nothing at all, silently communicated “perfection” compliment. He thinks my but is perfection. Sh** all else, if that is not one of the greatest and most powerful compliments one could receive regarding efforts like I have made. (Haha. I know, it’s a terrible phrase.) He knows how hard I have worked, and he helped me to see a success today that I had not known that I had.

Afterward, I took a photo from the side, just standing normally. And, wow…, I agree with him. It looks like a butt model for pants, the photo.

I have extremely high expectations for myself. It was valuable beyond compare today for me to hear such feedback from such a knowledgeable person on the situation. I have been frustrated a lot about my struggles and failures elsewhere on my body and in my performance lately. And so, it was nice to have a stellar success pointed out to me, and by someone whose opinion I cannot disregard (even if I’d wanted to do so).

Thank you, gym. Thank you, owner. Thank you, butt. And thank you, God, for this beautiful combination for my life. Thank you, all.

Post-a-day 2021

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

Marriage is what brings us together today

I had dinner with a friend last night, and we were talking about how we both still had to send in our rsvp for a friend’s upcoming wedding. We discussed briefly what we each would do for our own wedding invitations, and I made a comment about how crazy it would be in the first place, if she were to receive an invitation to my own wedding. ‘You, too, eh?’ was something like her response. A conversation ensued about my views for myself on marriage.

It has been a recent discovery for me – meaning just in the past year or so – that I cannot quite see myself ever being able to marry. To me, anyway, there is a sanctity to marriage that includes the line ‘no matter what’. I do my best to say what I mean and to mean what I say in life. And I do my best to correct what I have said, when I discover afterward that I have erred. I believe that I could not honestly say and mean that I would be willing to commit to remaining in and working for a relationship no matter what.

To put an extreme example to this, I have read Jane Eyre. (Have you?) For those who haven’t read it, but intend to read it, and don’t want anything given away, ignore these next two sentences, and pick up at the bold font. Essentially, Jane Eyre falls in love with the ward of the girl she is tutoring, and she wants to marry him, but then finds out that he can’t actually marry, because his mentally insane wife lives in his attic (or something very close to that). So, she leaves him and is in shame for having loved a married man, the crazy wife eventually burns down the mansion and dies (I think in the fire she sets on the house), and Jane and her love are reunited years and years later, when he is old and blind (or, again, something to that effect) and legally single again. Not that you needed so much detail, but it’s a ridiculous story, and there is no part I would be willing to play in it. ‘No matter what’ includes ‘your spouse has gone mentally insane and tries to kill you’. And I know that this is an extreme example, but it is merely an example. There are a multitude of situations in which I would not want to find myself, if I couldn’t let a relationship go. I know, too, that they are all incredibly unlikely. But they are possible, and I would be lying if I agreed to staying together and loving one another no matter what.

This isn’t to say, of course, that I would be unwilling to share my life with someone. I am definitely willing, should that someone come along. I just cannot honestly say that I could ever marry that person.

Now, that is my recent discovery – one that really surprised me, when I discovered it – about marriage and myself. As dinner was ready just as I finished explaining it to my friend last night, our conversation topic turned in the direction of food. And so, recalling today that we hadn’t ever gotten to the ‘you, too?’ comment that began my non-marriage-details reveal, I sent the friend a message about it. The following was exchanged between me and the friend, revealing her thoughts on her own possibility of marriage.

……………………..

H: Also, we never finished a certain conversation. I seem to recall that you had visions of yourself not ever getting married, but we never went into details on it

Friend: Definitely a conversation to be continued!
I think I’d like to find someone that I’d think about marrying. But my life is pretty great when I pull my head out of work and enjoy it! I don’t agree that there should be pressure to find someone to share your life with to make you complete. Also, I’m realistic about what it would take for me to get to that point with someone (a lot). I don’t trust new people that deeply very easily. And I don’t date a lot. But there ARE things I’d like to be better at fitting work around: horses, fitness, my dog, friend time, trips I want to take. So I’m focussing on that. If the guy thing happens, it happens. Sometimes I get a little down about it, but usually I just try to focus on all the good things and don’t worry to much about it 😁

H: Oh, my goodness.
Yes.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That’s perfection in words.
(Minus the missing o near the end)

……………………………..

And so, there you have two modern-day female views on marriage for themselves. I hadn’t considered the topic in quite the words she used, but similar ideas have definitely arisen for me. Yes, I want to share my life with another/others who are close to me. No, it ultimately does not have to be a spouse. I just don’t like living alone in the first place – I want loving people around me, supporting me and being supported by me in everyday life. I want to share the joys and successes and failures of my own life with someone, and vice versa. But it doesn’t have to be someone with whom I have romantic ties. That’s part of why I loved so much how my friend listed the things she loves and on which she wants to put more focus in her life. I believe that, when we do the things we want to do, and we go the places we want to go, we find the people we want in our lives. (I even said something almost exactly to that effect in a video I did for a class in college, talking about one of my study abroad semesters.) And so that is my goal in my daily life. Sure, I would love to find that someone perfect. But doing the things I love to do, and going where I love to go, and spending my life with people I love and who love me… that’s the most important goal for me in my daily life right now.

Post-a-day 2018

Smells of me

It’s funny to me, the things that make me feel so comfortable, so at ease, that it feels like everything is okay and is going to be okay. Tonight, not for the first time since I have returned to living in Houston, someone told me, “You still smell the same,” and followed up my question about it with, “You still smell like you.” And this is a comment I’ve had from lots of people over the years. I have a very distinct smell. It’s mostly just my deodorant and essential oils and oil blends that I use for various things in my life, but there is something special-feeling about the fact that people associate those smells with me. It is as though one of my favorite parts of me and my life is something that people not only notice, but usually really like. And, most of all, they remember it. That to me is special, and I so love having it happen, it makes me feel whole and complete in the present moment… even though I have no idea what is next for me in life, and even though I’m not too glad or proud of where things stand for me in my life in this moment, people still remember and love me.

Post-a-day 2018

Bliss on the winds

Walking, walking, I hear the swish-chh, swish-chh of my steps through the ankle-high grass, plants, and flowers. Taller grass lines my path, and flowers surround me in any direction, waving delicately in the wind, reminding me ever so slightly of bobble heads and those dashboard dancing creatures. The wind makes a muffled howl over my ears as it whoos around and past me, giving me the perfect balance of cool air and hot sunlight. My hair whispies whisp around my face like the pitter-patter of raindrops on my face during yesterday’s sprinkles. Goats bleh at nothing in particular ahead of me, frolicking in the grass and climbing in the trees, occasionally falling out like it’s no big deal. I see one of the new babies following suit, monkey see, monkey do… for goats… I want to bottle this up (and take it everywhere with me, so I can pull it out whenever I am sad), runs through my head. But I know that it would be odd, bottling something that, in itself, expresses freedom, openness, and ease. You Can’t bottle this – that’s the point. That’s why it is so special. That’s why I am here right now. Because God and the world knew it was perfect for me right now. And it is perfection.

Grace, followed by gratitude and love. That is my today.

Post-a-day 2018

Sometimes…

Sometimes, things fall apart, free from control or attempts to do anything else with them.

Sometimes, things come together, free from control or attempts to do anything else with them.

And sometimes, the difference between the former and the latter is that action was desperate and limited in the former, but honest and free in the latter.

Life sure is beautiful, ain’t it? 😉

Post-a-day 2017

Mr. Right

I’ve been thinking tonight about my Prince Charming, my personal one, my desired future. It all started with thinking about musical theater as I showered. As most shower stream-thoughts go, I ended up on a very loosely connected tangent. Do you know the song by Chris August called “Stranger”? It’s a beautiful song, and I fell in love with it several years ago. A lot happened related to that song, but let’s not go there now. While some specific lyrics rolled through my head over and over again, as song lyrics so often do, something struck me.

I dreamed you.
Now, I’ve found you.
Call off the search,
’cause I found my stranger.

Those were the specifically inspiring words tonight. Though I have listened to the song more times than I know, and I know every word still, despite having stopped listening to it years ago (for reasons I won’t mention just yet), I have never had the thought that followed those words as they repeated in my head tonight.

“I have never dreamt you.”

Though I have wished and wished, and even hoped and prayed and asked for my partner in life, I have never dreamed him up. I have begun ideas before, but I have never come up with what my partner in life actually is. You could ask me now, and I would have no idea what to tell you about the partner I want. Sure, there are plenty of things I know that I don’t want, but everything else seems to change with how I feel each day, each time someone asks me about it.

Now, I don’t exactly see this as a bad thing. I just happened to realize that I have never dreamed him up. So, I can never have Chris August’s song become a reality for me – I can’t find my stranger. I don’t even have a vision in my head of what it looks like being with someone. Every time I have dreams where there seems to be a sort of partnership, I always seem to be the one taking care of someone else – the traditionally male role. Or, perhaps it is the mother role I play. I already seem to do that all over the place in life. It’s the reason I have always wondered if I can ever find someone to take care of me. But I digress…

I realized in the shower that I have no image of a person. I don’t know if I’m looking for someone tall, dark, and handsome. I don’t know if he is foreign or domestic made. I don’t even know what kind of skin he has. Again, I don’t necessarily see this as bad. I am just noticing it. I also notice how so many others seem to have dreamed up their partners years before they even have begun dating others. I mean, they seem to know what they want. By having that idea of what they want, they are able to seek it out. Sometimes, when they find it, they realize they didn’t want it after all. And sometimes they find something better along the way. But they have something to pursue. I don’t even have an idea to seek out, a type of someone or something to pursue. Perhaps that is an issue with being so open to the world and to new ideas, and for knowing that what I see or think isn’t always the best that the universe has to offer.

Post-a-day 2017

God, bless me, please

I don’t know what it is, but something has me unconcerned on the whole. I don’t quite have a place to live after this month. I don’t quite have a well-enough-paying job as of this week. I don’t have any health or dental insurance once I move back to Texas next month. And yet, here I am, trying to get myself worked up, because I am not already concerned about these things.

Why am I unconcerned? I don’t know. There is something in the air though, that tells me that everything is okay, everything will be perfect once I’m back home. So, I am trusting. I am keeping an open mind, and I am listening when things come up.

Let us see where this takes me next month… 🙂
Post-a-day 2017

Sing-a-longs for school?

Yesterday, I brought my ukulele to class. It was my final day of teaching, and I only had one class. Seeing as it was with the students who are in the music course program at the school (think of it as being like a college major, but in high school), and they were the only class of the day for me, the teacher asked me to do something relating to music, if I could.

For the longest while, I had nothing. I was just too exhausted and mentally worn out even to think about ideas, let alone come up with some (let alone good ones). But, as I found myself fiddling at long last with my ukulele on Wednesday night, – this was after having decided just to do a non-music-related activity – I wondered if I couldn’t pull off just singing songs the whole class period.

Sure enough, my brain decided to work for me as I played some songs for myself. Kids could sit where they wanted, and look up lyrics on their phones (Yay! for phones in class.). We could start with the ABCs, since some of us had specifically discussed in that class a few weeks ago that Japan seems to have learned only the first half of the alphabet song, and then made up the rest, making the whole thing weird, and having everyone always mumble out somewhere along the second half. From there, we could “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”, and then move to some real songs.

I was nervous about my uke playing, and the fact that I’m really just a beginner on the instrument, having come as a lazy-esque mid-level guitar player, and simply become a lazy-esque ukulele player. However, I practiced several songs, and the chords really came back to me rather well, and I even learned some new ones quite easily as I went along.

Once in class, I offered for a student to play the uke. Two kids in the front happily took over tuning it for me (I have a decent ear, but I knew theirs would be better.) when I asked, and one even pre-guessed the notes, singing them aloud for tuning (think of perfect pitch folks). So, I thought they might have had experience with ukuleles. This is Japan, after all. However, the only kid who said he possibly could play a little – usually Japanese for ‘I’m rather decent, but just don’t play too often these days,’ – tried out the uke, and discovered that the chords were different from any instrument he knew. This means that he strummed some odd-sounding chords, and then I reclaimed my ukulele with a bit more confidence and determination.

I taught them the alphabet song, and we had a wonderful time of it all, moving from that to the stars to “Under the Sea” to “Let it go”, and finally “The Lazy Song”. There might have been another in there, but I’m not recalling it right now.

All-in-all, the kids had a blast and didn’t seem to stop smiling, I had a blast, and the teacher was utterly pleased with the lesson and class (she even kept saying so over and over again afterward). I wish I had been able to do more things like that before, but the schedule never really allowed for it. So it goes – it made for a wonderful final class, though, a magical send-off for me. And that is beautiful.

Post-a-day 2017

City Surprises

Making my way through the nonsense that is the Shibuya Crossing on a holiday afternoon, I am feeling almost desperate to be on a train home. There are just so many people in my way, with no respect for my desire to be not here. Not that I actually expect them to know I want not to be here – I am merely noting their ignorance to the matter. I am almost to the station, when a small but clear opening appears right ahead of me in the shuffling crowd.

I hardly have to think – in fact, I think I know what it is without thinking – to recognize the colorful lettering on the page of that folded-open notebook being held just above people’s heads.

FREE HUGS

I hesitate a moment, verifying that the holder of the sign is respectable/huggable. Despite my being in Japan, I accept that this young Japanese guy is holding the sign, and trust that he knows what it means. Perhaps especially because I am in Japan, actually.

He’s young and Japanese, and he looks trustworthy. I throw open my arms, and instantly see his face light up, as he says an adorable “Sahn kyuu!” (How the average Japanese pronunciation goes for ‘Thank you.’) We embrace, and it is solid and long and wonderfully perfect. I return the verbal thanks, with emphasis on thanking him for the hug (as opposed to his thanking my willingness or whatever on my end), give a gloriously contended smile, and go on my merry way the last few yards to the station.

I savor the experience, and especially the loving hug, as I wander goofily through the crowds up to the tracks. Thank you, God. You gave me just what I needed in order to feel I was heading the right way just now. I am in the right place right now, and it is perfect. Thank you.

Post-a-day 2017