Kids, your high school guidance counselor was right: you need to have goals.
Four weeks in to my return to martial arts training, and I was floundering. It had a lot to do with the fact that when you're forty, your instructors are half your age, and most of your classmates are half your size, you feel your age. Acutely. On my best days, I feel competent. Bob, one of my classmates, is my bitch - I can snap his head back with my sidekick, or crush his ribs with a front snap kick. (Of course, Bob never blocks me, and never moves out of the way, as he's a rubber sparring dummy.) On my bad days, I feel slow and lost, tripping over my own feet and tangling myself in my arms, my bones filled with cement instead of marrow.
Last night's class: seemingly endless repetitions of Basic Form # 3, a cycle of middle blocks, low blocks, and side punches. Some tweaks to my stance, but otherwise, I had it do. "Looking like a Black Belt!", one of the instructor kids told me. "Thank you, SIR!", I replied, without a hint of irony. Then on to my 45 Degree work: stepping out from your attacker at a forty-five degree angle, block his punch, knife-hand jab to his ribcage. Repeat from the opposite side - and that's where I got flummoxed. I'm sure a neurologist could explain why I can step RIGHT/block LEFT seamlessly - stylishly, even, like Neo - but when I'm required to step LEFT/block RIGHT, I suddenly become early 1960's Jerry Lewis. Work through it, I thought. Again, repetitions - step left, block right, step right, block left. Again. Again. Again. Show that Left Brain who's boss.
Martial arts classes with a bunch of kids: at once deadly serious ("You don't ever want to start a fight - that's what bullies do, and being a bully is against everything a Martial Artist stands for - but if a bully starts one with you, you want to be the one who finishes it.") and sublimely goofy. The class concluded in the goofy vein: we took turns pairing off against each other in a silly melee'. Foam pool noodle in hand, we stood in opposite corners, were told to close our eyes and keep 'em shut, and spun in a circle fives time fast by the instructors. The goal: in pitching, wheeling blackness, find your opponent and bop him on the head with the piece of foam. First one to do this wins the match. Everyone took turns staggering around like drunks at sea, foam tubes flailing wildly, to the cheers and laughs of their classmates. (I lost.)
Goals. We end each class with a formal salute: line up, bow to the senior instructor, bow to the senior student. This time, our senior instructor had something for us. "You guys did GREAT today. Everyone worked hard. As you work towards your next belt, you get something when you show us that you've mastered certain techniques. Something that shows you've reached a goal. Anyone know what that is?" A bunch of small hands and one big one shot up. A small voice - Lucas' - answered. "Belt stripes, ma'am!" The instructor approached each of us and wrapped a piece of white electrical tape around one end of our belts. "Three more of these, and you guys will be ready to test for your next belt. Good job! Keep it up!"
Lucas and I drove home; I stripped off my sweat-soaked uniform (another painful difference between me and those kids - to me, Tang Soo Do is a friggin' workout) and wandered into the kitchen in search of Gatorade. "Mom!", Lucas yelled. "I got a white stripe! So did Dad!" "That's great, honey! I'm really proud of you! Both of you!" A month in, and some tangible progress. I gulped down the Gatorade, and patted myself on my stiffening back.
