Volleyball and Other Hobbies I Tried to Quit

From soccer, to hip hop dance, to horseback riding, if I could sum up my adolescence in a few words, I'd say that I've always been a quitter.

It sounds harsh, but the internet is a place for honesty (and really weird memes). And if I'm being honest, I have a knack for quitting new hobbies.

Here's how it inevitably happens:

• I try a thing.
• I like the thing a lot. 
• I promise I'll come again.
• I think that this thing could be my thing. I imagine myself doing this thing when I'm 80 years old.
• I tell everyone how much I love doing the thing.
• I go again.
• I go another time.
• I think of something else I could be doing in that time (like writing hit songs for my new album, or working on my self-published magazine, or eating pasta sauce out of a jar while reading Anna Karenina).
• I make up an excuse for why I can't go to the thing this week.
• I make up another excuse for why I can't go to the thing this week.
• I quit the thing.

I don't think there's anything wrong with this pattern really.

I remind myself that I am a social butterfly, a lone wolf and a quirky performance artist all rolled into one weird, winged, howling animal-person.

I tell myself that I can't adhere to a schedule. I tell myself that I am far more mysterious when I don't show up to things. 

Basically, I just tell myself a lot of excuses so that I can stay home, read Anna Karenina and eat pasta sauce out of a jar.

But now that I'm out of college, these excuses don't really fly anymore. If I don't have places to go and things to do after work, I end up feeling like I wasted the day.

At best, it's uncomfortable, and at worst, it's depressing. 

So what's a girl to do? Try a couple of different hobbies until one sticks?

That would be good-- except that in Japan it's practically impossible to try something once without people thinking you're a member for life.

I mean, I guess it makes sense. I live in a small town. My business is everyone's business.

It's basically like living in Gilmore Girls except when people here talk fast and make obscure references, I have no idea what they're saying. 

But still. 

When I first arrived here, I somehow joined an elderly persons' volleyball club. It's a long, weird story, as usual.

I loved playing with them on Tuesday nights-- for a few months. We laughed, we danced, I struggled to speak Japanese in a way that wasn't 100% wrong.

But after awhile, I got bored and wanted to quit.

I don't think I'm really a sports person. Besides, one very old man was always standing entirely too close to me. So I had to come up with a no-risk quitting scheme.

It required some forethought. Quitting here was a lot more of a challenge than it was back when I wanted to stop going to funky disco kickboxing in high school.

I couldn't just tell my mom that I had homework to do.  

All my volleyball pals were running into me at the grocery store, every day, asking me why I hadn't come to volleyball the week before.

Was I sick? Was I out of town? Did I get a new boyfriend?

The answer to that last one was yes, but his general existence wasn't really why I hadn't been showing up.

A couple of months went by. I'd show up once in awhile. I'd try to enjoy myself while I was there, though I had lost all interest in playing volleyball. Sometimes, I'd even go so far as to repeat the words, "you are currently playing volleyball" over and over in my head. I thought it might help to keep me from daydreaming.

The two hour practice would come to an end, and I'd always promise I'd come again the next week.

I started to dread Tuesdays. I wanted out and I wanted out ASAP.

However, when my pushover-ness led me to try a new hobby, I came up with a plan to wash the old one right out of my hair.

A few months ago, a few of my students told me that they really wanted me to go to their calligraphy class. The kids even went so far as to corner me in the hallway with a handwritten map and ask me to promise that I'd come.

So I showed up one fateful Monday, assuming it would be a one time thing.

I left the classroom that day promising I'd come back the next week, secretly cursing myself for getting involved with another hobby when I still couldn't get volleyball out of my schedule.

"Calligraphy is fun!" said my brain.

"Calligraphy is a commitment," replied my intimacy issues.

Perhaps I was torn about the inclusion of a new activity into my week; however, I wasn't torn about the fact that my new hobby finally gave me an excuse to quit volleyball.

Next time I ran into my volleyball friends at the grocery store, I told them that I wasn't going anymore because I had calligraphy at the same time (which was a lie, but a believable one). They nodded and expressed remorse to not be seeing me anymore.

I considered my volleyball woes to be over and done with.

Until I went to calligraphy, where my teacher informed me that she was quite close with the people on my volleyball team. Apparently, they had compared notes about my whereabouts on Tuesday nights. My ruse was unsuccessful. 

It was awkward. I just kind of looked sheepish and said, "I've been... busy..."

It's true. Reading Anna Karenina is practically a full time job.