This is now, as it has always been I guess, a joint venture involving both myself, an old git, and my daughter, a young and terribly gifted lady. She is 1st Kyu, me is 1st Dan and we now have to focus together for a very important grading around Easter time.
I have not posted for a very long time, laziness, disinterest, vacuous places where my inspiration should be, whatever the reason I am hopeful that 2023 will be a year of drive (to the Dojo daily rather than the Wife mad, daily), and together my Princess and I will achieve great things in our own tiny, itsy, corner of the World !
Osss.
Pandemics, Diagnosis & Twimmyo Pandae Bandal Chagi
As we find ourselves smack bang in the middle of a global crises where nearly everything is closed and house arrest has been respectfully asked of us all (except critical workers (Gods bless them)), I thought it time to reflect on my personal experience of the last weeks/months and the role Martial Arts has had on it.
Where to start? I guess everybody’s favourite month – January. I had survived Christmas without a blemish which was an improvement from previous year when both the wife and I got laid flat by nasty, nasty flu for the entire festive period, so much so the 11-year-old kid had to cook and clean for us. So, to get through this year reasonably unscathed was nice. Work was busy but I was feeling very positive about my progress on a huge internal project, and I was ready to wind down the debaucherous levels of eating and drinking and ramp up my training in readiness to grade for 2nd Dan at Easter, so generally life was good….
…. then in February my annual slump into the doldrums occurred and I once again hit rock bottom for no obvious reason. Ok work did start to be proving difficult and frustrating, my body seemed to be sending me signals that it wasn’t happy with the extra load at the Dojo with things going ping, pop and twang, but there was nothing big that warranted this latest in a long line of crashes.
Time to get this shit sorted, and a short story even shorter turns out I have Recurrent Depressive Disorder (bipolar for short whenever I’m discussing it) which has been an unwelcome companion my whole life, born with it the Shrink reckons. It certainly explains plenty of things least of all the once every 12 months fall into abject sadness. So, signed off from work for lord knows how long, Spring not far away, and a big bag full of tablets to munch on I settled down to mend my mind ‘yet again’ when ….
…… Covid-19 happened! Literarily a week after I started the new happy tabs Boris shut the country down. Well that was bad timing and all rather unfortunate. I couldn’t even augment my drugs and therapy with a visit to the Dojo to beast my demons out with a few of Sensei Sean’s advanced classes. What to do? Karate is massive thing in my life, the Dojo is a sanctuary where pain is weakness leaving the body! It’s a place of healing, regeneration, the dojo is a place where you can safely and in the name of fun go get a punch in the face and pat each other on the back afterwards. And I can’t bloody go because the buffoon in power has ordered the doors locked!
As well as my wonderful girls to keep me company I do have dogs that need walking every day which is a great boon to be fair, strolling out with them twice a day picking up their shite. But of course, out in public everybody is eyeing up everybody else like they have the bloody plague, which they sort of might have. So even a pleasant walk in the woods with the Schnauzer boys brings its own mental challenges. And besides, pandemic or not it is still frowned upon to drop a gyaku zuki on a total stranger in the middle of the afternoon.
“Picked a fine time to lose my mind “, is my new favourite saying.
However, the situation has brought yet another new facet to Karate that wasn’t there before, and one that the great art has probably never seen in all of its long history. Working closely with Sean and Karen and the other Instructors @ SDSMA it became obvious very quickly that we all had to get agile and do so sharpish. We not only had to do what we could to ensure the Dojo could open again when this shit storm is over, but we had to keep ourselves active and sane (some more than others), keep our students active and learning and developing, and also to support all the parents and carers who were house bound with the little darlings. And all of these challenges are underpinned by the fact that it all has to be done via the tinterweb by an ageing bunch of ‘Geezers’ with a varying degree of technical ability and very fat arthritic fingers.
The response has just been fantastic and extremely uplifting when all around us is mostly bad news. The students have got stuck right into the online classes SDSMA are running, and the Students are giving the same levels of commitment as they do at the Dojo. It is a struggle teaching online and we have had to adapt the training to cope with such things as sofas, coffee tables, walls, slippy floors, dodgy wifi, pets/parents/siblings randomly wandering across the tatami and a general lack of space to work in. But the work ethic of those taking part could not be better.
Personally, as a Karate Ka and Sempai with Recurrent Depressive Disorder the daily routine of connecting in and seeing my small group of students each day has been extremely rewarding, and I know the other senior grades/instructors have felt the same. As mentioned above, it is not easy, there is lots of stuff you just cant do, you have to allow for funny camera angles, different floor surfaces, varying space to manoeuvre in and dodgy Wifi links that sometimes freeze leaving a student suspended in mid air with both legs off the floor. But we are all getting on with it as a community, as a club, and that has been extremely beneficial to me and an important aid for my recovery. Its not a substitute for training as a club in our Dojo obv…, with all the Instructors there, on a proper Tatami and room to ‘jump turn crescent kick’ without fear of taking out a vase or killing the cat, but it has proven to be just as valuable to everyone’s wellbeing during this awful period in our lives.
Needless to say, these difficulties and challenges that I speak of are nothing compared to the daily nightmare our critical workers are facing every day. I can’t even begin to imagine what must go through your minds each day as you leave the house for work, and a ‘thank you’ and banging a pan with a spoon once a week hardly seems anywhere near enough.
And I also can’t write about your struggles so instead I have shuffled some words together on a subject I do know about (me), and I dare say many will argue I can’t write about that either, but I have had a go anyway. Hope you enjoy.
Onwards and upwards.
Sempai Jason
Oosss
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SDSMA Newsletter item
Just found this knocking around my work laptop, a piece written in 2014 for the SDSMA Newsletter. Handy as it saves me having to think anything up at this moment in time. I do have plenty to talk about but have a very mushy head so will wait until that’s cleared before getting my blogging head back on…..
There be Dragons
The Serengeti roars to the sound of the Lion, the vast Canadian forests echo to the growl of the Grizzly, on the Russian Steppes the howl of the wolf pack is a thing to chill the heart, and down in Moorside on a Wednesday night the darkness rings to the sound of Old Dragons crying out “oooh, ouch, yep, can feel that…”.
This final animalistic sound is the product of martial arts for the middle aged. I myself am included in this merry band of diehard’s that persist with the stretching, the warm ups, the drills, when sensible people our age sit in comfort in the wings while their young offspring perform the splits, run around with boundless energy and lash out those kicks at a height that is an impossible dream for the 40 something.
However, while we realise that we will never get to represent our country at a World or European championships, or train for the chance to get to an Olympics one day, the personal prizes that can be gained by taking up Martial Arts later in life are strangely even more rewarding than fame and glory.
I decided to make the first naive steps out onto the blue and red floor of the Dojo in order to encourage my tiny 6 year old daughter to get through those first few lessons. It is a scary place out there for a small person with all those shouty people running about in red pyjamas, so I felt she would need a familiar face next to her during those tentative first few lessons, albeit a face much redder and sweatier than she is used to. 12 months later and I am training at least 4 times a week, more if body and time allows, while the daughter has to be dragged along to her 2 classes a week and only on the promise of a slushy afterwards.
Those first months are very hard, much more so than your own preconceptions have you believe. I can remember joking with the wife when starting the first class in September 2013 that I’ll be a black belt by Christmas. What a fool.
At first Just getting the arms to fold the right way on a basic block is a total mind melt once you have been legging it round the hall for the 20 minute warm up, let alone trying to work out how to raise your leg more than 8 inches off the ground for a round house without rupturing yourself. And you drag yourself from the mats at the end of each class knowing full well that tomorrow is going to be painful to sit still let alone move around! But it very quickly becomes an addiction and you find yourself training with more gusto and greater eagerness week by week. The aches are pleasant ones, the pains seductive. You very quickly sign up for unlimited training, buy all your gear, start up the sparring classes, consider a competition ‘just for the experience, just a one off, you know, to try it out, won’t make a habit of it…’
You even start looking round the curtain at those BJJ boys, wondering if a cuddle on the floor with a huge bloke in black pyjamas is the next challenge to set yourself.
It doesn’t take long, almost unnoticed at first, and your fitness improves, your flexibility improves (a little) and your sharpness in training improves. The drills start to become instinctive and you know what block is coming up when the Korean term is shouted at you by the Sensei. It all starts getting a little easier. And then you grade, a nice new belt, and you have to start learning new moves, more steps of the first Kata. You spend weeks getting that right then you grade again and a whole new bunch of challenges arrive with that new coloured belt, a greater expectation to be getting it right. And the cycle continues, grade after grade, belt after belt.
Then you realise you still haven’t been doing it right, getting lazy? Getting sloppy? The Sensei will catch you out and expect you to fine tune all your basic kicks, blocks and punches, square the shoulders, lock the arm….and it goes on, challenge after challenge.
The more you train the more you appreciate just what it takes to become a black belt, the hours and hours of training that’s involved. And while it seems a very long way away, almost too far at times, you make a silent pledge to yourself to make it happen or die trying. My target is to be 1st Dan by the time I’m 50, knees permitting…
Hope I haven’t put anyone off, aiming for the opposite in fact and have placed my experience into words as a rallying call to all the mums and dads who have yet to try it. I would highly recommend it to all those parents who sit it out each week, it’s an excellent family bonding exercise with added health benefits. And besides, It’s a total buzz…
Jason, 44 years young, 9th Kyu (Orange)
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A nice start
Been a good week for training. I couldn’t resist Kick Boxing on Monday which was a splendid physical test. A great warm up preceded a long session working in stations, from pad work, shadow boxing, jog/sprint/pressup/burpee/squat rotations and then bag work. Absolutely beasted it giving everything in the tank.
Tuesday was my Senpei session with Sensei Doyland, and while ‘teachers assistant’ sounds reasonably easy it is actually quite tiring running up and down the line correcting here, advising there, demonstrating here,….
Wednesday was a rest day, everything ached from Monday
Thursday was advanced karate which made Mondays kick boxing efforts seem like a saunter round the park. Sensei Doyland took no prisoners and on more than one occasion I had a mouth full of vomit. The entire class was out on its feet, a very hot and very physical session, what an advanced class should be all about.
Friday, well rest day again I am afraid, but I am getting on now, things take longer to get over. Still Saturday is just around the corner and I have the delights of teaching Little Dragons in the morning, the little darlings. 4 to 5 year old Karate Ka’s , very unpredictable.
I might slip in the HIT fitness class with Kev Knights before hand as Krav Maga with Ash is out this weekend as have places to be early afternoon. And then Sunday going to give Kettle Bells with Shaun Mansell a crack before limping on to do Kata. So busy weekend, bring it on….As my instructor and mentor keeps saying “Pain is weakness leaving the body”
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Push for 2nd Dan
2 weeks in Rhodes did not do my fitness any good, lashings of cold beer, mountains of good food, one or two fags (dirty horrid things) and a total lack of exercise has rendered me bloated, wheezy and very lethargic. It is astonishing how quickly any semblance of conditioning can drop off when you is over 40. However that particular Greek Odyssey has now been consigned to the History book that is Bookface and a new mini chapter begins.
The push for second Dan in December is under way and much needs to be done to be ready. Pressure is off a little considering I set my target of 1st Dan black belt by time I was 50, so to be a couple fo years ahead of schedule is a bonus. The threat that the rigours of time present is still very much a lurking factor in all this of course, but generally my abused body is feeling ok, knees are holding up, hips only complain a bit and my strength and fitness can all be worked on. So if all the Gods (plural, best not to anger any by missing them out) are smiling down upon me then I should be ready by December.
When it came Shodan (1st Dan) did mean a lot, an awful lot. The sense of achievement was massive, but pushing for that next grade is now what matters. Not many people get to Black belt, but of those that do even less manage 2nd Dan or higher. It will be a sign of commitment , that this is now integral to my life, that Karate is in me bones. Even when those previously mentioned rigours make the decision that I cannot commit 100% physically to the art, my mind and spirit will continue and I really want to have at least 2 stripes on my black belt before the knees go pop.
The new chapter started last weekend, Friday to be precise. I had previously hoovered the Tatami a couple of times on a Saturday morning so all Karate Ka’s could train without any tiny bits of ‘Stuff’ sticking to their feet, but as I had the day off I felt it might be time to offer to mop/scrub the Tatami. This proved to be quite the work out….
It doesn’t sound much, flopping a mop round the room for an hour but so that it is done properly, and all those hours of blood sweat and tears are cleaned from the matts in readiness for the following weeks efforts, it affords a goodly amount of elbow grease.
To hoover and properly mop a Tatami the size of SDSMA’s takes minimum of 3 hours, indeed much longer when done solo.
It was a very satisfying thing to do and one that I think a lot of Martial Artistes these days do not appreciate. The Dojo is a sacred place and should be treated as such, with care and devotion. The cleanliness didnt last long however, during a Krav Maga class I was part of on the Saturday a chap split the bottom of his foot open and spilled claret all over the place so I had to clean some of it again….. inconsiderate bastard .
Anyway, training proper started last Thursday, but we wont mention that one. Friday was cleaning as mentioned above and Saturday was an hour of Kumite, 1 of Karate and then 1 hour of Krav Maga. This was wrapped up with an hour’s Kata on Sunday, by which time I ached somewhat. Loved every minute of it though and am hoping very much that this sort of schedule can be kept up for the next 5 months. Best I get a sacrifice ready for those Gods, hope they all manage to find this on the tinterweb, might need some divine intervention to keep this up….
Kick boxing tonight ? mmmmmaybe
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A new chapter
An exciting new chapter has started for me on my karate journey, I now run my own club. It is a satellite club of SD Martial Arts and runs Thursday afternoons at Colchester High School.
Taking over from another chap who quit the after school club thing 18 months or more ago I have essentially taken on 16 fresh new White Belts who are all pretty much starting out on the same blank page.
With 2 classes down and another 7 to go this term it is a great honour to both represent SD Martial Arts as an instructor, but also to work with such a great bunch of intelligent, enthusiastic and well behaved kids.
On top of this I am to start shadowing Sensei Sean Doyland every Tuesday as his official Senpai to further hone and polish my knowledge and skill set . I might just get to retire from working with Compooters much earlier than expected !
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Much ado
So, trained for first time after festive flu last night, was awfully good to be back on the Tatami. Was also pleasing to hear that the young, fit, supple youngsters that got their black belts in December are struggling with the jump in our Kata – Chung Mu, makes me feel slightly better about my dreadful attempts at it.
So whats been happening I dont hear you ask? I shall tell you anyway. Been 2 grading days since I last posted anything of note, a general Karate and Kick boxing grading for which I was on the judging panel , and the Dan grading for which I performed role of spectator only. Did a bit if sparring at the end as well as we had odd numbers.
The general grading was a busy day with an excellent standard all round. My princess Izzy got talked into going for her purple belt at last minute, the only belt she has ever failed previously. I wasn’t able to mark her paper for obvious reasons, but did keep half a worried eye on her performance. There were 3 blue belts hoping to move up a grade that day and none of them shone, making mistakes. Much debate ensued between the instructors on whether they warranted a pass, all of which I struggled to listen to and couldn’t really contribute, conflict of interest and all that, so I made a dash to the toilet until deliberations were all over.
So when every one lined up to see if they had a nice certificate, a new belt and a hand shake from the great man himself Sensei Sean Doyland, I was as much in the dark about the result as my Princess was. She was convinced she had failed again, I had my suspicions, so you can imagine the relief and joy for us both when her name was called out as a new 4th Kyu with a pass. We will take a pass all day long. Only 3 more belts for my Princess before black, very exciting.
Its a double edged kind of day, grading when you are on the grading panel and just another example of ‘you only really starting to learn about martial arts’ once you have proved you know the basics to get your Black Belt.
You want everyone to do well and get the result they deserve but are powerless to influence their performance and have to mark what you see. Nerves play a massive part in proceedings and usually sound reliable students can go to pieces if they mess up. Thankfully the final say is with Sensei Sean Doyland who seems to have this ability to see and notice everything that’s going on, quite a talent. But having agonised over the marking and decisions and feeling the pain of students who know they have messed a move up , the pleasure of watching the students march up to get their certificate at the end does make it all worth while.
2 weeks later was Dan grading with 3 juniors, one senior attempting 1st Dan, and Sensei Nigel Hutchinson going for his 3rd Dan. Being grade of 1st Dan I am unable to sit on the panel but have earned the right to watch from the side lines, this I did with about 8 other black belts who had come in special for the grading. I did spar when it came to that bit as there were odd numbers, which was oddly difficult, me fresh from sitting down with a nice cup of coffee, not warmed not stretched to spar with a bunch of people totally pumped up from 2 hours of drills and Katas.
Another nervous and seemingly long wait while the judging panel, Sean, Joe Anderson and Pickles, made their decisions. It could have gone either way for all of them, it wasn’t a perfect grading with mistakes made, but then I don’t remember mine being perfect either. But it did look hard, slightly harder than I remember, but did reinforce my wish of attempting 2nd Dan next December, injury and wear and tear permitting.
But focus before that is helping The Whizz through her brown belts.
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2019 here we come
2018 ended with a Dan grading, more to come on that one, and then 2 weeks of influenza which poleaxed me. So tonight, 10th Jan, will be first run out this year. Again more to follow……
realise my biogosphere is well out of date , have had much to dwell on
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Interesting evening
Had a day off from the drudgery that is the office and instead spent some quality time with the wife doing a bit of shopping and a spot of second breakfast. At 4:30 pm however I presented myself at the dojo to cover 2 classes for the absent Pickles who was off on a jolly with his woman.
Sensei Doyland was obviously very excited about me teaching as he messaged me 2 minutes before I walked through the Dojo door saying “See you in a minute yeah?”, although it could have been related to the fact that there were 15 kids under the age of 8 waiting for their Wednesday evening chop chop.
we split the Kid Kick and Little Dragons up between us with me taking the Dragons (6 and under) who were greater in number than the Kid Kick’s. Its a very unpredictable thing teaching karate to persons of that age and size. Some days they all nail it, are impeccably behaved and as they walk off the tatami they leave you with a sense of pride and achievement that you did a good job.
Then there are other days when it is absolute purgatory with them all running amok, not listening, the odd one crying, lots of toilet breaks, a total lack of recall on which is left and which is right, fair amount of nose picking, and at the end of it not a huge amount of karate done. But I guess this is all part of learning how to be a good instructor, because all of the above scenarios are not wholly restricted to the classes for the under 6, the 8 years and upwards have their moments as well so knowing how to change this atmosphere into the hard work, focus and effort that karate demands is a valuable asset! I still have some way to go…..
So with wisdom and great technique imparted on to the young ones I turned my hand to the 8+ karate class that followed, usually one of the busiest of the week by all accounts. With horrific traffic and possible other reasons this one however contained just 3 kids, one of which had never done martial arts and actually turned up to do boxing. Wasn’t a bad class, they did as they were told, 2 of 3 knew left from right and we also managed a bit of dodge ball at the end.
Then it was me time, an hour of Kick Boxing to work out the knots, stresses and strains with a good run round, lots of abb work, few smacks in the mush and plenty of fluids lost in the form of skin leakage. Very different work out from Karate and is a nice change, although does effect your hand positioning when you return to a karate class. I keep finding myself either dropping into a Kumite stance in kicking boxing, or hands up like a boxer in karate class. One commonality between the two though is I cant kick in either so thats one less thing to worry about.
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Saturday Double
It was double Chop Chop this morning, Kumite and then an hour assisting the Sensei in the biggest karate class of the week. Nice little work out on the basics in Kumite before running a mini competition where I shadowed Stuey’s Refereeing.
Second class was large, and Sensei Sean placed strategic buckets round the Dojo for his brown belts, it promised to be a hard one for the lucky few. The pace was frantic even for the white belts, but the 3rd Kyu and above had lots of lovely burpees in between the drills. Then they started the up and down the dojo, with burpees in between each length, followed by all Kata’s, more hands and legs up and down the hall, more burpees, more kata, more drills, more up and down, then more up and down, then the order to “Pad Up” for a bit of sparring.
It looked tough, but I remember from this time last year the classes leading up the Dan grading. It seems ridiculously hard at the time and very frustrating as its just impossible to please the Sensei, but it is all for a reason.
Train hard, grade easy.
Today I was very thankful it wasnt me being pushed hard but I did remember the same punishment last year with great fondness. It teaches you a lot about yourself when you are almost crawling up and down the hall in front of everyone, dripping in sweat, snot hanging out both nostrils, hardly able to stand let alone keep in proper stance. with Sensei Sean shouting in your ear the whole way like a drill sergeant.
Great effort today by Mia, Josh, Luka, Andy, maintain that attitude and you will be getting a Black Belt for Christmas. Oh and Stirling work today 2nd Dan Nigel Hutchinson.
And after a spot of lunch in the Energyze cafe a face (and a big gut) from the past turned up threatening to come back to training. No one believed him of course
