An unexpected compliment

I received an unexpected compliment today.

But first the background:

Brian and I went to Houston last weekend to visit Phillip, an aikido friend who has been working on getting a group started on the east side. They recently relocated to a community center and lost their weekend practice times, so his main two students came to his house to play and hang out on Saturday night.

No one got photos of me, but here's Brian and Phillip playing in the living room.

Phillip asked Brian about the owaza jupon (don't quote me on the spelling of that), or "Big 10" kata, which Brian immediately passed off to me.

The Big 10 is nicknamed the "Big Snip" in our school because the focus of diverging centers in the techniques is best accomplished with very little use of muscle. But males want to muscle everything and tend to struggle with their testosterone to complete the techniques correctly, so we jokingly tell them to "leave their balls in the dressing room" for this one. Brian defaulted the question to me because I don't have as much trouble muscling through the kata as he does.

Anyway, I demonstrated a couple of the Big 10 techniques for the Houston crew. Apparently I impressed and surprised. I was told that one person's eyes "got so wide," as he apparently didn't expect me to actually knock him down. Another guy told Brian I was a "badass." It was all rather nice.

But the actual compliment came today. I got a text from Phillip asking me to call when I had a chance. During my lunch break I call and am told about some kind of women's event happening Thursday evening that his wife is taking part in. She was talking about the school to some women involved in the planning and they seemed interested in East Houston Aikido Club representing at the event. Phillip wanted to take part to get more exposure for his group, but wanted a female to help with the demonstration to pique more of the audience's interest.

Unfortunately, I can't make the event; I'd have to take half a day off tomorrow (Thursday) to make it by 6 p.m. and make the return after 9 p.m. and likely still go to work the next day. I just can't marathon that kind of trip anymore, but I really really wish I could. As an alternative, I told Phillip if he was still going to go to the event and pass out flyers, I could video some sample demos he could share with any interested passersby, but I haven't gotten an answer on if it would be helpful or not.

Fortunately these events are apparently not uncommon, so a chance to do this again -- and hopefully with a little more time to prepare -- in the future is not completely out of the question.

I haven't died!

Holy cow. Spring officially started but Audrey has been silent? No needlessly detailed posts about my scatterbrained gardening ventures? No reflections on my current life status?

I didn't drop off the side of Texas. It's just been a busy couple of months. Since the visit to NOLA, Brian and I have both been busy with our jobs, including working several weekends for me. We helped some friends of ours pack up to move to Washington in February.

We miss these people...

Then I had my birthday a couple weeks ago (which was a really great couple of workdays and weekend off). I got myself a hair cut for the occasion, as is my yearly around-birthday tradition.

 Coworkers made me and the manager (we have the same birthday) wear sashes all Thursday. Friday I left early and chopped about seven inches off my hair. 

Brian and I took Acer to the vet the day after my birthday. We'd intended to go to the range in Pflugerville afterward, but getting the dog in to be seen took a lot longer than we anticipated, so we stopped in Georgetown and visited the first Second Saturday street fair of the year instead. We showed up late, so got some great deals on pastries from one stall.

This guy was promoting his school. But the claims seemed to be a bit puffed up. *badum tish*

This weekend we stayed at a seedy hotel in East Houston to visit a new satellite dojo of our club in Killeen. They have a pretty nice location and are just trying to gain some more members to study with. If anyone is reading this near the Highlands/Crosby areas and interested in tomiki aikido, here are the links to their Meetup and Facebook pages. It's a good group of guys studying the art but not neglecting the martial.

After a good three hours of playing with the katas, we got to meet up with some of my old friends in the Houston area, which I'd been needing for some time now.

I was thrilled to see Carlos, Steph and Matt (not pictured, as he had to go to work) This was taken in a parking lot around midnight, right before a security guard in a golf cart stopped to stare at us until we dispersed.

Before heading back yesterday we swung through Lufkin and Nacogdoches to get my pine tree fix. We got food at Pepper Jacks and, after some mis-routing from the GPS, ate at the lake. Brian found some twin pinecones he was very enamored with.

Aren't they cute?

Soo, now we are back home. I ended up with a surprise four day weekend because I'm scheduled to work this coming weekend, so I'm trying to get caught up on things. Once I'm through here I need to get cracking on the taxes and an oil change I'm overdue for. BUT, I want to ensure all that my gardening ventures will continue into 2016. These are some dated photos, but I'm still working! I'm actually narrowing my focus to herbs this year, and the Grow Your Own Cocktails kit I got for Christmas has been interesting for that.

This was taken Feb. 28. The big ones are blue borage, which are now in a big pot. Everything but the mint and lavender has also been moved to larger temporary or permanent homes.

I'm also trying some more kitchen scrap experiments. These carrot tops are sharing a pot with a single radish from last year that decided it loves the cool weather we've been having lately.

I also got a pink bush-like plant from Jacque for my birthday. It's currently shedding it's pink leaves, as it's wont to do, but should re-grow them over the next month. She also surprised me by anonymously dropping off a strawberry plant one morning last week. I didn't know where it had come from for two days. I'm kind of excited about strawberry plants. I've wanted them for a while, but just never got them for myself. I'll enjoy them for sure.

My attempt at a compost bin has been nice. As it's mostly old potting soil with the addition of kitchen scraps, I feel it kind of had a head start, and I've already been using it for repotting sprouts.

Two pepper plants from last year, one bell, one banana, have survived the winter and are growing new leaves. I'm hoping they'll to better now that they're a little older and, possibly, more established.

So here's to a slightly more narrowed focus in plants this year. Maybe it will help to be less scattered. I also got a pretty windchime for my birthday from Korri, I'll bet its rainbowy magic will do well for my little green experiments.

I really do love this. I just have to get up really early to get the sun hitting it favorably and haven't 

managed to do that since getting it.

In defense of sport and demo martial arts

Recently, a video of a ten-year-old Irish girl performing a series of sword techniques has been circulating on Facebook. This was the best way I could find to link it to this blog, since the video I'm specifically referring to doesn't seem to be on YouTube.

A lot of the people I originally saw sharing and commenting on it were not, to my knowledge, involved in martial arts. Most of them were impressed with the girl's fierce display. For a young kid to be able to perform the kata with such ferocity clearly indicated to them a future in badassery.

Then my martial arts friends got a hold of it. I saw this still from the video (shared from a sword arts page I am unfamiliar with) featuring this added caption.

It led to a discussion with Brian about the snobbery we've noticed in martial arts circles. A sort of "pooh pooh" attitude toward any art that is not the one that particular individual practices.

Brian and I have both been playing in tomiki aikido for almost four years. Before this, I had played with a college judo club and Brian grew up with Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Both of us spent time in competition-focused environments before joining the aiki crowd, which does not generally compete.

While there are a lot of egos in the mixed martial arts crowds -- at least in some that spill in to visit our dojo from time to time -- neither of us feel that there is anything inherently wrong with practicing a martial art in order to demonstrate it or compete with it. We seem to be the minority in this thought process.

Over and over we hear martial arts veterans saying things like "Oh, jiu-jitsu is good if you want to lay down as soon as a fight starts," or "Aikikai is too fluffy to be useful," or "judo guys train to let go if you tap, what if a street attacker taps? They'll just let go."

If there's one thing to understand from doing martial arts for any considerable length of time, it's that every system has holes in it. Period. If there was one perfect martial art, everyone would do it. There are different systems because they evolved for different situations, cultures and goals. The United States, in general, is not a feudal society. But we've always loved a good fight (ex: boxing). Thus the rise in MMA's popularity (my issue with MMA is unrelated to the fact that it is a sport, but that's another blog topic all together).

Judo and jiu-jitsu stemmed from the fighting styles of warriors who used swords, staffs and their own hands to take down enemy soldiers. Aikido and aikikai stemmed from judo (I'm sure there are similar lineage connections in the "kick-punch" arts of karate, tae kwon do and others, but having not practiced them, I cannot list them off the top of my head). But no one art was ever intended to be all-inclusive. Certainly principles can be taken from one art to the next and applied successfully; aikido principles of keeping centered, oscillating your opponent and moving yourself, for example, are very applicable on the ground, where most aikidoka do not frequently go.

Aikido is largely a standing art, so my weakness was groundwork. So I started playing with Brian, practicing how to move so I wouldn't get scared should I ever end up on the ground. His BJJ background helps me with the hole in my understanding, and it helps me practice principles like keeping my hands centered in alternative environments. I'm not a fan of the joint locks that he favors, but I've learned where they can be useful, though they don't creep into my randori much.

But what's with all the hate for training to get points? Or training to demonstrate? Just because someone has spent their energy focused on submitting opponents or maneuvering out of unfavorable positions means they aren't as much a martial artist as someone who focuses on "being the water" and moving around an attackers force? Or a person who practices beautiful katas with non-obstinate partners can't be taken seriously because "Well if I do this, that won't work."

Yes, martial arts are generally studied to be some sort of defense system for the practitioner. Yes, martial arts training can save lives and even de-escalate  intense situations. But you can not tell me, assuming that ten-year-old Irish girl continues training, that if someone tries to grab her while she's holding a broom or pole or other stick-like object she wouldn't walk away unscathed. Or if a "points-fighter" jiu-jitsu guy or boxer gets tackled by someone fleeing cops he wouldn't be able to at least daze the assailant until the authorities can catch up.

I just wish the attitudes of superiority could take a back seat sometimes. Sure, there are a lot of problems with MMA. There are also a lot of problems in judo, aikido, karate, jiu-jitsu and any other system of martial art under the sun. The point is not not argue about which art is better. The point is to pick one that works from you and explore the others to fill in holes you find as you go. Keep an open mind.

It's okay to disagree with the approaches of other arts. It's fine to try it and conclude "this won't work for me." It's great to try it and think "this approach would work really well with how I do this." It's not okay to flippantly say "This art sucks."

Martial arts is a personal journey for each practitioner. Some do it for exercise, others to learn to defend themselves. Some love the art side and others love the people. Most I've met do it for some combination of things. Let's not take away from another person's journey by belittling the path they chose.

 

(Hell yeah this is going toward my word count)

Word Count:  980

Total Word Count: 4,009