Hula - A Great Spot Remover

Yesterday was a weird day. I was glad when it ended.


I was wearing a skirt that's sort of a silk-type fabric. I like the skirt a lot. I like its burnt orange color, I like the waistband, I like the way it hangs. What I don't like is that today it got a little stain on it.

I noticed it right about the time I noticed my backpack was pulling my skirt up and up and up until my ass was hanging out (Thank the Maker for spanx that look like bike shorts). When I first noticed the stain I thought it was just some water that splashed on me. Long after enough time had passed for the water to dry I noticed the spot was still there, that it wasn't water, it was a stain of some kind. By this time I was at work. I went into the ladies room, put the bottom of my skirt into the sink, added soap and tried to scrub the spot out. I scrubbed until I couldn't see the spot. When I was finished I discovered that the water had carried itself across my skirt. The whole right side of my skirt was sopping wet. I went back to my desk, turned on my little floor heater and proceeded to dry my skirt. It dried pretty quickly but when I looked down to inspect the fruits of my fabulous attempt at turning my work's bathroom into a laundry facility, I noticed the spot was still there! The whole day, no matter what I did,

The Spot Wouldn't Go Away.

Unfortunately the incident with my skirt served as an allegory for my whole day. I just couldn't get the hang of yesterday. I'd expect that of a Thursday, but not a Wednesday. My day was filled with incidents that I couldn't wrap my head around right away, then once I did, something else happened that I had to figure out. I guess this kind of day happens to the best of us. I'm not unique in having a bad, or at least annoying, day at work.

Fortunately, being Wednesday, I had hula to go to. And let me tell you, hula hit the spot.

This November (I think I mentioned this before) we're combined with the other Wednesday class and learning some new stuff. It's pretty challenging. We are learning a new kahiko, a new oli and a new 'auana; a little bit of each every class.

Spot removal started with the ride to class. I carpooled with a hula sister and got to complain a little (OK, a lot, thanks hula sis for listening to me) about my day, then I got to hear about her life since the last time we drove to class together.

Warm up was pretty swift. At the tail end of warm up we usually do a few hulas we know pretty well. One of the hulas we did was Kai A'o Mamala. I always get a little dizzy during the "kou kino noho malie ah ha hana  . . ." verse.
When it became my turn to be in the front line I was willing Kumu not to say "Ia oe ka la." Man I am not pa'a with that one. I should be, because we've been doing it long enough, but I just can't get it. Thankfully Kumu didn't tell us to dance that one. He told us to get our pu'ili so we could dance Alekoki. Not my strongest dance, but markedly stronger than my Ia oe ka la. I made it through Alekoki without embarrassing myself. Yay me.

We spent about a third of our remaining time on the kahiko, a third on the chant and the rest on the 'auana. It's challenging learning 3 different things on the same night. I'm getting through it OK, though. Still, true to form, the oli is proving to be the easiest of the three. I've always been stronger at learning the chants and the words to things than I have been at picking up new hulas.

Then hula sis and I drove home. The drive home served as a nice bookend to the evening.

When I got home I popped my head in The Boy's room and found him awake. I crawled into his bed, talked for a few minutes then sang him his favorite song. Then I went out to the living room and hung out with The Girl for a little while. I missed her. She was at a sleepover the night before so I hadn't really spent any time with her in a few days. I may have kept her up later than she should have. After she went to bed, Hubby and I hung out, watched some TV and went to bed.

My whole spotty day was washed away and made better by a good night at hula and some time with The Fam.