Year of the Tiger

I've been thinking about keeping a diary of my martial arts training for some time now. A long time, actually. Ok, a really long time. At first, I thought: "I'm just a beginner. I don't have anything special to say." (I now find even beginners, or maybe especially beginners, can have very insightful things to say. But I thought I was being humble.) Then, before I knew it, I'd been training for 35 years. Where would I begin? (Of course, when I began training, there was no world wide web, and even cheap personal computers were almost a decade off. So publishing anything would have been a challenge).

But here it is, 2010, and everyone from kids to grandmothers has their own blog. Hell, people's dogs have blogs, for Pete's sake. So I guess it's my turn at last. And, perhaps ironically, I'm going to start not with myself at all, but with my wife, Claire.

Claire has been training in Karate-Do herself for almost 20 years. Over the years, as just about every martial artist does at one point or another, Claire wondered if her training was really effective. She is small but has a fierce spirit. She is, in fact, a Tiger in the Chinese calendar. But she was never totally convinced that she'd be able to defend herself if she had to. (I'm sure all Martial Artists have had fighting dreams, nightmares where our techniques are futile, punches land like a tap with a soft pillow, our legs as effective as columns of Jell-O. Claire has had her share.)

Today, she got to find out if her training was worth anything.

She was crossing a busy street in broad daylight, in a normal commercial part of town. She noticed a couple of people in the area and cataloged them in her mind as potential threats. One was a "creepy" guy at a bus stop. The other was a single man in a jacket and hooded sweatshirt walking on the sidewalk she was approaching, coming in her direction.

(At this point, I would stop and say her training was already showing its worth. Many people walk (or drive) around in their own little bubbles, paying little attention to the world around them. We have been taught a system of awareness and vigilance when out in the world, and Claire's awareness was kicking in automatically.)

She reached the other side of the street and noted the guy in the hooded sweatshirt still coming her way. She altered her path slightly to walk along a building so she'd have a wall on one side, away from the street. She turned her head for just an instant, and that's when she felt the hand on her shoulder. She wonders now if she even was touched or just felt his intention, but she began to turn to face whatever was there, and that's when his hand grabbed her left wrist. It was the hooded sweatshirt guy.

Claire said he was about 6' tall and somewhat large. Now, Claire is 5'4" and weighs all of 100 lbs. Just about ANYBODY looks large compared with her. The man didn't say anything, just grabbed her with his right hand on her left wrist. His left hand was in his jacket pocket. Claire didn't think. She didn't have time for fear. She didn't suffer the feeling of unreality that often overwhelms people in crisis situations. She just did what she has trained to do. She dropped her body weight down, pressurizing her legs and, connecting her arm to her hip, pulled her hand free from the man's grasp. (This is the first thing we teach the kids at their introductory class, how to escape a simple one handed grip.) This unbalanced her attacker and he bent forward a little. Claire uncoiled all the pressure she'd built up in her legs and intended to smack the guy in the head with a back knuckle strike. But the guy was bending down and so her elbow caught him in the jaw instead. 100 lbs moving quickly with a hard point at the end. F=MA.

And he dropped. Out cold.

He was still out when the police arrived a few minutes later. A bystander had called from her cell phone. When they heard what had happened, one cop glanced at his partner, then at Claire and said, "You did that?"

We don't know what the assailant was after. Claire thinks maybe he mistook her cell phone pouch for a purse and was going for that.

As far as the physical effectiveness of Claire's response, there can be little doubt. She did exactly what she has trained to do, pictured in her mind for years and did it without fear or hesitation. That is the essence of physical kata (form). But to me, the real proof that her training has been effective was how Claire reacted to the incident.

After the initial adrenaline rush (she said she felt like she could have knocked out 5 more people!) she began to think, "I've hurt someone. Could I have done something different?" We talked about it, and yes, there are other techniques we practice that might have let her control her attacker without clobbering him in the kisser. But those are not without risk. She could have found herself rolling around on the sidewalk with a crazy man, armed with a knife, with traffic roaring by a few feet away. She might have broken his wrist, or he could have hit his head, not to mention all the bumps and bruises she could sustain, even if she won a tussling match with a guy 6" taller and 100 lbs. heavier.

"Maybe I could have just escaped the hold then run away. I didn't have to hit him."

Maybe. She had about .5 seconds to make that decision. Long enough to notice the hand in the pocket. Holding what? Nothing? A pack of gum? A gun? When the cops searched him, they found a knife in his left pocket. Was he going to use on Claire? Would he use it on someone else if Claire got away? These are the kinds of questions no one can answer. But the fact she even asks herself these questions says volumes about the true spirit of the Martial Arts and Claire's mastery of that essence.

The bottom line is: Claire wasn't hurt (though her elbow is sore). The attacker wasn't seriously hurt (though he will have a painful jaw and will have to explain to his cell mates how a whisp of a girl knocked him out cold with one blow). And maybe this will change his life for the better.

There's no question in my mind Claire has learned the best that the Martial Arts has to teach. The Path is endless, but for her, today, her training was good enough.

So I start my own karate diary by bowing to my wife, classmate and former student.