JOURNEY - on Mastering Ukemi Page 2

  “So in my dojo, here, there are a number of people who really want to train at aikido. They already know the techniques. And I see you attack with a nice, smooth yokomen or shomen.., uchi... slashing cuts aimed at the head, and they don’t really experience the flow of ki, or the intensity they would like. See what I mean?”

  “So I am not a good uke?”

  “You aren’t an uke at all, yet. Just because you play the role of an uke doesn’t mean you have a clue what you’re doing. You are training muscle memory as well.”

  “Who should I learn from? I want to be a good uke.”

  “Erik, Curtis, Christian, Bill, Ron… Chris is very good… but what you have to understand is that it will come naturally. Once you gain the confidence in your rolls and reverses and counters you naturally start attacking with more ki and with more heart. You’ll get it. I promise. Besides, being a great uke is a state of mind. A great uke can never be overcome.”

  There was a knock at the door. I saw Christian waiting outside. Celine stood and gave me one of her thousand watt smiles and waved as she bolted out the door.

  “Sensei, did you want to see me?”

  “Yeah, Christian, come on in. Why don’t you go get us a couple beers.”

  “I’d appreciate a coke if you don’t mind.”

  “That’s fine, but ask my wife first about the coke, I’m sure it’s fine, but she kind of runs the kitchen and I run the bar.”

  “Thanks, Sensei.” He went off to find my wife and get the drinks. I looked at the important computer work I had been doing and closed the lid. I never win, anyway.

  When he came back I told him to sit down. “Christian, is everything okay with you?”

  He looked down and then around my wife’s office, the front porch, really, but where she likes to work and where her desk and computer and files were kept. He scratched the dog’s head and then tried to find a place to set the coke down, where it wouldn’t leave a ring or get knocked over, but gave up.

  “Christian, I get to know the students here pretty well after five or six years and I can usually tell when something is bothering one of you. If you don’t want to talk about it, I understand. I just want you to know that I’m here for you and that I don’t want a lapse of concentration on the mat to result in an injury.”

  “Sensei, it’s not that I don’t want to talk to you, it’s just not really all that important when you consider what‘s going on in the real world.”

  “Okay,” I said, “But you should know that the real world is what is perceived. Man is the measure of all things, like that. So what you’re feeling might not be much in the whole scheme of things, but if it affects your life, your perceptions of your self, and your happiness, well, I think it should be looked at. Don’t you?”

  He looked at the coke can for a few moments and then said, “Linda and I broke up. I don’t really know why. I’ll be graduating from Rollins in two months with an M.B.A. and my workload right now is ridiculous, so I haven’t been spending a lot of time with her. I will be able to, in, like, seven lousy weeks. I’m working and going to graduate school and practicing aikido with you and still try to see her as much as I can, but she broke up with me. I don’t know what to quit doing to find more time for her.”

  “So you feel like you’re to blame?”

  “Yeah. She keeps saying that she never sees me and that we can’t have a relationship that is all one-sided. She needs to feel needed.”

  “Do you need her?” I asked.

  “Of course,” he said.

  “For what?”

  “I love her.”

  “Why?”

  “Why does anyone love anyone?” Christian asked and then shrugged. I smiled and shook my head. Men. We are such jerks, I swear…

  “Christian, I’m not asking why anyone would love anyone else, I’m asking why you love her.” I looked him over for a moment. “I mean she’s good looking and sweet, and she probably does nice things for you… but what about her is special for you?”

  “Sensei, I’m just really tired. I don’t get a lot of rest and this is all too much for me right now.”

  “Okay. But I want you to think about something as you drive home. Just think while you’re driving, for me. Here’s the thing, if you make this your fault, you can fix it. See what I mean? If, in your mind you take the blame for the break up, you get to spend lots of time holding on to the memory, and the love, and the rest of it, and maybe, if you figure out what went wrong, you can make it all better.”

  “I know. I can change and then get her…”

  “But Christian, most times, it’s nobody’s fault. That kind of thinking, that it’s your fault, is just a way of hanging on. You just drag things out that way and lose all self-respect and the respect of the people around you. Maybe she met someone she likes better than you. Did you think of that? Maybe she never really loved you and has only now figured it out. Maybe she realized that you two just aren’t magic and decided to find someone who would make it magic. Christian, sometimes relationships just don’t last. But if you make it your fault, you get to hang onto it for a long time, when you should just let it go.”

  “Well, that’s easy for you to say.”

  “It is,” I said.

  “I don’t want to let go.”

  “You don’t have a choice, unless you intend to stalk her, which is another way of holding on.”

  “But I love her.”

  “Yeah, we’ve been over that.”

  “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Christian, sorry, but actually you do.”

  “Well, what?”

  “Give yourself permission to do what you really, deep down want to do.”

  “I don’t know what I want to do!”

  “Then why are you moaning and groaning and wandering around with puppy-dog all over your face?”

  “What?”

  “If you don’t know what to do, then why are you doing what you are doing? Why are you acting like this? If you don’t know what to do, why did you choose this method of acting out to express what you are feeling? See?”

  “Wait a minute. I think I see what you mean,” he said, “If I don’t know what I am feeling, why am I choosing to act this way?”

  “Right. But take it a step further. I know that in your teens and early twenties the only emotional and social guidance you get is from song lyrics, but answer me this - and you actually have to think about it first - don’t you feel just a little relieved that she broke up with you?”

  His eyebrows raised and then he frowned and started to speak. I held up my hand sharply and pointed to his head. “Think first.” He shrugged. I waited. He smiled. Then he frowned.

  “Okay, yeah, I guess. Maybe I do feel a little relieved. At least now I have time for homework, real work, aikido, and classes. Without the pressure, I mean. But I still love her.”

  “Christian, that’s probably true. And you probably will for a long time, but at some point you will discover that what you think of as love has turned into the memory of love. Son, that is almost as sweet as the real thing. You drive around Winter Park and see those old men in the rocking chairs smiling, in front of the nursing homes? They’re remembering. But what you need to embrace right now is the feeling of relief.”

  “I just think about calling her and trying to explain that things will be better.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “So I can see her again.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, you know…”

  “Christian, when a woman quits you there are certain rules that a man has to follow. Basically the rules are the same as ukemi. When she says it’s over, then it’s over, just like a punch that flies by your head that you can never get back. You just have to let it go and get on with whatever is next in your life. Give her a hug and kiss, tell her it was great, ask her if she needs a loan or a ride anywhere. Offer to carry her bag to her car. Smile, wave goodbye and go watch a ball game with the toilet seat up and a
cold twelve-pack. Period. No whining, no begging, no sign whatsoever that you want her to return or that you regret anything. Those are the rules.”

  “What if she comes back?” he asked.

  “She will.”

  “She will?” he asked.

  “They always do.”

  “They do?”

  “She hasn’t called you?” I asked.

  “Well, yes, to see if I was all right,” he admitted.

  “Change your telephone number,” I said

  “What?”

  “Just kidding.”

  “Sensei, are you making fun of me?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  “I can’t help myself. I always look for the humor in any situation and face it, life is pretty funny. But it can be pretty distracting when someone quits you, I know, so, sorry about the humor, but not the advice. The advice is gold. Never look back. It drives women crazy when you don’t chase after them, but you have to get on with your life. Sometimes women break up with men just to get their attention.”

  “See? Yeah! That’s what I think might be happening.”

  “Then definitely do not go back to her. You don’t need a life partner who is so cavalier with your emotions. Anyone who would put you through that in order to get what she wants is not someone you want in your life. Think of the games she would be capable of playing with your emotions if she is able to do something like this. Talk about emotional blackmail. Move on, Christian.”

  “I never thought of that. It makes sense.”

  “It does make sense,” I said. “It’s ukemi. Go forward forcefully and with pure intent. Attack from your heart to the heart of your opponent. Be prepared to die or to escape, and when it’s over, it’s over.”

  “Thanks, Sensei.”

  “Now, if you’re not going to drink with me get the hell out of here and leave an old man in peace.”

  “Okay, and thank you very much, really.” He picked up his bag and went off to say goodnight to my wife, pet the dog, comment on the new rug, pet the other dog, and finally leave.

  Chapter 3

  Ukemi

  I’ve spent about forty-five years studying martial arts in one shape or another and going on forty years in aikido alone. You get to know something about a subject when you have been at it longer than Christ walked on the Earth.

  My dojo is hot in the summer. What the heck, my dojo is hot for much of the spring, all of the summer and nearly all of the fall. It is situated outdoors in Florida. The winter can be pretty cold during those few months when the evening temperatures drop into the forties and sometimes into the upper thirties. The dojo is out of doors and we wear wool socks and sweat suits under our uniforms of gi and hakama. Consequently the people who train here are pretty tough when it comes to comfort and take what comes in stride. Somewhere, someone has a picture of me teaching class wearing fur-lined slippers and a down vest over my gi. Someday I’ll figure out who’s been showing it around.

  Christian started training here when he matriculated into the University of Central Florida about seven years ago. After graduating with a degree in business and a minor in computers he worked for a year and then decided to get his M.B.A. at the prestigious Crummer School of business at Rollins College. He is what I term, a ‘nice guy’, someone most anyone would want for his or her best friend.

  Of course, that could be said about anyone who trains here at Shoshin Aikido Dojo. I hand pick each student from the hundreds of applicants I get each year. Veterans get preference, of course. After that I screen for education, talent, perseverance, and once in a while attitude and charisma. Each student is different and is considered and treated as a unique individual.

  Aikido is a martial art that tends to develop differently in each person. Body shape and size, strength, attitude, education, ethics and many other attributes affect the development. Consequently I look for certain things in the students I select, but the most important is that indescribable quality of friendliness. I don’t mean a big smile, or being talkative, or a joke teller; I refer to that quality that makes a person want to develop a genuine friendship with another. It is, I admit a pretty elusive and difficult to describe attribute, but when I see it, I know it. And those men and women who train here have that quality. Christian could well be the poster boy for that quality.

  Everyone who meets him just likes him. He is not special; he just has that Opie Taylor kind of genuine likeability that made him such a favorite on the Andy Griffith Show. Christian is a serious man at the same time and is wickedly intelligent. As a shodan, a black belt, he is popular with all the students and is one of the inner core of students who train here.

  So that’s why I got concerned seeing him in the dojo one night pounding on the heavy bag. He was stripped to the waist with only a pair of ragged gym shorts hanging sweat soaked around his skinny hips. He’d lean in and hit the bag and I could see the hand wraps and gloves strain with the power he was putting into the effort. Wham! Wham! He threw a jab, then another and followed them by a series of right hands that drove deep into the canvas and rocked it against the back wall. He threw big hard punches over and over until he had to stop and then began with stinging left hooks interspersed with jabs. I stepped back away from the screen and slipped into the night away from where he could see me. If he needed to exorcise some demon, he had the right to do it in privacy, even here at my home and in my dojo.

  I eased down the boardwalk until I came to the steps that lead up to the railed deck behind my home. My old Labrador retriever met me there and I scratched his ears as we made our way up and over to the cushioned chairs surrounding the big table. Key West lights twinkled in the darkening while the evening sounds came interrupted by the synchronous pounding of the bag in the distance. I wondered how long he would keep this up, but knew from experience that it would not be for long. No one can hit the heavy bag for long; it wears you out. It requires a lot of power to make a big bag move.

  I remember seeing Sonny Liston when he would come into the Twentieth Street Gymnasium in Denver, Colorado. You always knew when Sonny was in the building. We would be up there in the balcony with the ring, the speed bags, the heavy bags, the jump-ropes, weights and other training devices. Some guys would be hitting the speed bag and a few others would be working on combinations with their trainers and then you would hear this sound. It was like an explosion without the fireworks; it was like a collision without the crash. It was Sonny hitting the big bag. Whump! Whump! Wwhhhuuump!

  With each smash the whole building shook and the fighters would make their way over to the railing to look over and see the legend making the huge old bag of sand and canvas and duct tape dance. He was old then and wore a towel around his neck as he hit the big bag, sweat running out of his thin, graying hair into his thick, creased neck. No one stared at him long because the trainers would bark at you if you did. No one ever bothered him for an autograph. As far as I know no one ever spoke to him. He would suddenly be there, and the building would shake as he pounded the big sand bag down in the gym and then he would be gone. After a bit some of the guys would drift downstairs and you would see them try and make the big bag move like Sonny Liston had done. What he made look effortless was beyond the capacity of anyone in the place except him.

  He threw punches from his sides like his arms were too heavy to lift. You would see him raise one ham sized fist up and throw it at the bag and the whole thing would lift six inches into the air and then crash down at the length of its chains and the rafters would reverberate. He did this so slowly you could hardly believe it when you slipped down the stairs and threw that solid hook into the big bag and it didn’t move at all. It did not move at all. In fact it hurt. No one could make the big bag move.

  I really don’t know what the big bag was for because it weighed so much that no one ever used it, no one except Sonny Liston. He was a bear that growled and hunched his way around it and slashed at it and for him and him alone that bag danced the
tango. It was hanging in the corner downstairs away from all the rest of the boxing gear and although some of the karate people like to kick at it, no one ever made any good use of it. After Sonny died they took it down and I can’t imagine any good end for it. I learned that you could break your wrist if you hit that bag wrong and that if you hit it right you could make it jump for joy. I never once hit it worth a damn.

  ***

  I was sipping beer in a tall glass when I finally heard the tired old screen door to the dojo squeak and then slam. Christian went into the luthiery studio where we let the guys change if they’re shy or want some place to hang their clothing. After a while he walked up the steps and sat down in the deck chair on the other side of the table. I reached out and poured him a beer from the pitcher on the table and when he had taken a long sip he sat back.

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “I’m not sure what there is to say,” he said.

  “Okay.”

  “I mean, haven’t you ever felt that something just sucks in your life, but that you couldn’t name exactly what it was?” he asked.

  “Well, not since I was pretty young,” I said. “I understand that when a young person doesn’t know what he or she is feeling, it can be disquieting. I also know that indecision and uncertainty over your future can also be unsettling, but it happens to everyone. So normally when I see someone your age going through all this angst I assume that it is really what we used to call growing pains. I haven’t heard that expression in a while. It must not be politically correct in this age of youth worship.” I filled my glass and sat back again. “The thing I am concerned with is that you are sound. Not if you are uncertain about your future. I expect that. I am concerned about your direction. I already know you don’t know where you’re going. “

  “You’re right, Sensei. I don’t have a clue where I’m going.”