Dissin’ on love

I haven’t talked much about the HoopGirl Instructor Certification class I attended. I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. Like, on the one hand, I got a lot out of the class and learned more than I expected. On the other hand, I felt like my teaching style wasn’t New Age-y enough for the instructor since I didn’t want to talk about rays of energy and instead wanted to be silly and have fun.

For the sitting portion of class, I happened to be sandwiched between the two oddest hoop-makers of the bunch. The one on my right believed he was far superior to HoopGirl (who has been making hoops professionally for 10 years) and described the jigs he’s made and his methods of sanding certain parts better than HoopGirl. It was kinda off-putting, even if he had some good ideas, and I learned from him.

The hoop-maker on my left was so New Age she made my brain foggy. I felt like I smelled Nag Champa incense emanating from her aura. Her deal was that she made energy hoops, all custom decorated by hand with symbols that embodied special types of emotional harmonies. Like one was the Happy Hoop, so it had gemstones representing happiness inside it, and she had cut gold glitter tape into suns to decorate it. Too labor intensive and spacey for my tastes. To me, girls just wanna have fu-un.

I had a rough time at hoop boot camp because of my broken leg. Forget the pain. I hadn’t really hooped much in nine months, and it wasn’t like getting back up on a bike for me. I was really hoop retarded. And it humiliated me. These girls and guys were RAWKIN their hoops, workin it out, and I could barely pump around my waist. They kept saying it was OK and it takes all levels to enjoy hoops, but I just wanted to die or become magic. Preferably magic.

Nag Champa girl handed me the Love Hoop. It was decorated in red and had silver glitter hearts, and it was filled with stones that represented the spirit of love. “I think you need the love hoop,” she said to me as she smiled and held it out to me.

I rejected her, feeling superior to her wacky brain: “No, my hoop’s OK. It’s got more grip tape on it.”

I did it again. I was condescending. It’s taken me two weeks to realize this, but I was offered love and I said “No.” Positively no. I didn’t give love a chance, I didn’t let love into my heart, I didn’t allow someone who believed they could help heal me even to try. She saw my pain, and I said “No.”

Love may be strange and come to you in many forms, but don’t say “No.” Next time I'll let in love, even if it smells like Nag Champa.