Upon arriving back from my morning run today the delivery man appeared right behind me outside on the stairs as I came up. Four boxes of custom Hulk's boxing gloves and handwraps -- a 100 of each. I was already running late with starting the club cleaning because I had gone for my run much later than anticipated and then ran into a little altercation with some super buzzed middle aged men outside the subway station when I took Pyen Chi for a walk. I had but only an hour to get my post run meal in, shower, walk the other two dogs, and clean the club. But there on my stairs stood the delivery man, telling me I had four massive boxes all taped up and calling my name from his truck.
I ripped open the first box. It was stuffed to the brim with sweet looking white boxing gloves. They had red palms and our club symbol and name printed on them. They looked beautiful!!! I resisted the urge to rip open the other boxes and prepped the club for opening but, once the club was ready and open, I dove into those boxes like a little kid on Christmas!!! One of my mini Hulkies had come early for training and she had brought her two friends that often sit and watch. I bribed them with grilled fish and juice to get them to help me unpack and organize the pro shop and threw in a club key chain for both; I was in a super excited mood.
And then I waited.
I had 24 names on my list -- members who had jumped in on our Price Smash event and had bought either a 3 month or 6 month membership. Twenty four names but only one would be first and so I waited to see who would be the very first member to get a brand spanking new pair of custom gloves. I must admit here that I did hold off on giving two other members their gloves until I finally picked the right first person to give them to. I just really wanted to make the first pair I give out to go to a member that is extra special to me and our club and who would share in my excitement.
And then the perfect first person came in.
She absolutely was thrilled at the sight of all the new gloves and handwraps and she eagerly tried them on. We snapped some pictures, exchanged lots of smiles and high-pitched comments of excitement, and then I checked her off the list.
When I posted news of the gloves' arrival in the Hulk's Facebook page, almost instantly my phone started buzzing with messages -- members all eager they had finally arrived. I had 24 Hulkies to give gloves to and today 14 of them received their pair. It made for a super busy day of teaching members how to properly wrap their hands and members trying extra hard to work in their new gloves. I designated a couple of shelves for members to put their personal gloves on but noted that many took them home. "I want to show my brother!", one Hulkie told me.
It was super cool to see how excited our members were when they received their gloves but I think the best moment of the day came when I had to teach the oldest of my two mini assistants how to wrap her hands. Most of our newer members and our younger members too often just wear the simple white material gloves inside our boxing gloves because either they don't hit hard enough to hurt themselves or they don't know how to use their body to hit hard so extra protection is not necessarily needed. Well, that and some members just have decided to hold off on buying handwraps just yet.
The oldest of my two mini assistants is 12 years old and she always seems attached to my hip when she is at the club. I think the whole training bra incident with her awhile back really bonded us and so I find I am much closer with her than her sister. Anyways, today I taught both of them how to wrap their hands and then they wrote their names on their new gloves. After I wrapped one of her hands, she looked at it carefully, tried to replay some of the process in her head and then tried to wrap her other hand by herself. Success. The look she gave when she had successfully finished her wrapping was priceless and in that moment I didn't know who honestly felt prouder, her or I.
The excitement of today's shipment lasted all the way to closing and beyond. My night ended with me getting into a funny chat about it all with the boyfriend of the young couple who usually trains around 11pm. Tonight he had come in alone to train. Snickers had slipped out for a late dinner and so another member and I showed him some exercises to try out. After his training we got talking and it wasn't until after 12:30am that we realized just how late it was.
Club closed after 1am.
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