Happy Valentine's Day

I gave my kickboxing instructor a Spongebob candy Valentine. He grumpily took it and asked, "what's this?"
I said it's "Spongebob! губка боб!"
He looked at for a moment and said, "What am I supposed to do with it?"
Skipping around him like a 5 year-old I exclaimed, "Alik! It's Valentine's Day!!!"

He had totally forgotten today was Valentine's Day and when I reminded him he said, "Oh yeah... Thanks!" But then, the rest of training he was in an even worse mood than when he first came in. I don't know what his deal was, probably it’s that he’s sick of being alone, at 40-something, and holidays like this remind him of his loneliness.

As I mentioned in the last entry, a common defense mechanism out here is psychological projection, so naturally he started to take it out on me.
He started saying shit like when I go home I’m just going to get fat, like I did when I came back from America this last time.
I explained, “when I was home, I was on vacation, so sure, I ate, but when I’ll permanently be back in the States, I’m obviously going to be doing some sport to keep up my health/shape.”
He was like, “being home was not a vacation, it was you pigging-out and being a slob.” He was totally being rude.
I responded, “being home with my family IS a vacation to me, and what, it’s not like I came back that much bigger, and it’s all pretty much gone now!”
With his hands out to the sides to imply a fat ass, he responded, “but you did come back a little bigger.”
I said, “I was home for two weeks, so sure, I just relaxed! But when I’ll come back for good…” Then I realized I was defending myself to him for no reason, so I asked point-blank, “Why are you being mean to me?”
He didn’t answer.
After that, I might have said, like, five times, “Don’t be mean and rude to me. I don’t deserve it.”
He didn’t respond at all. I’m sure he just felt worse.

I didn’t let him put me down (not on Valentine’s Day! Hurray for love! Flowers and hearts!) We finished training on a somewhat positive note; I asked him advice for my aerobics class, which always strokes his ego just a little bit. I like the guy, but he ain’t my man, he ain’t family, and no one gonna be telling me that I’ll be getting fat other than my Daddy.

Happy Love Day to all y’all!