a day off

Busy and relaxing days recently. I will regret the lack of income later, but just now having a Monday off is the best feeling. Review in the morning, cementing the Sun style tai ji (73) form, doing it fresh after yesterday’s seminar. Review in the afternoon, too, blending into the night as twilight fell quickly to darkness. More Sun style, lots of sword work, still not enough time.

And I read some today, too. Yes I, the former used bookstore co-owner, now without a non-budo page turned in weeks or longer. At this rate, and with the size of the book (Jung Chang’s Mao: The Unknown Story), I will still be working on this one next year.

Friday night was a banner night – my daughter and I went to Gong Fu class and she actually trained for the entire class for the first time, no breaks to play or draw. Saturday night was also a banner night – an old kendo friend visiting from way up north in Tsugaru. We visited an excellent practice in an elementary school gym in the downtown Shitamachi area. The teacher is 83 and still damn strong, taking on a row of 7dans at a different dojo practice.

Last week I was massacred in a kendo tournament in the same elementary school dojo. Couldn’t score a point on either opponent, though I did get one of the three refs to raise his flag. I’ve never been a tournament guy and much prefer to just practice, as we did on Saturday. Still, I was a bit more fired up than usual, still licking wounds from the prior week and drawing on that energy.

Getting up early tomorrow for morning kendo practice. Listening to the night sounds just now - crickets and bugs outside, footsteps fading, a siren in the distance, then the sound of a train. 5 AM wakeup comes much too early...