Change of Game

It’s only a week or two away and the AustralianNational Iaido and Jodo Seminar/Championships are already looming large on the horizon.  My long-suffering Wife, Kik and our two dogs will make the 9 hour drive down to Melbourne in order to catch the ferry over to Tasmania.  It’ll be a good road trip.

What am I expecting from this seminar?  Well, I’m choosing to omit (from this discussion) my challenge for Jodo 3^rd Dan at the end of the week.  Look to the countdown timer, to the right of this page.  I’m also electing to dismiss the comps:  I’ll do my best but if I don’t come away with pretty-ribboned medals or be able to touch a silver trophy, it won’t bother me – too much.  Instead I’m musing on the martial arts journey that’s led here and where it’s taking me.

If one were to stand out in front (where the Sensei stand) and look towards the long line picking out where I would stand, I’d be spotted somewhere around the middle.  God-like higher grades to the left (as seen from the front) and the pond-life scum (only joking) towards the right.  It’s a safe position for me to be in: the higher grades do not expect me to instruct very often and the lower grades don’t often look to me for guidance.  Very comfortable, thank you very much.  But I think this is about to change for the worse.  Sensei has told me so.

Nagayama Sensei has decided I have the potential to be a future Jodo instructor and is going to call me out from my comfort zone.  What crazed logic drives this choice I don’t know.  Suffice to say Tassie is not going to be an easy ride as the goalposts have shifted.  I have to learn how to demonstrate perfect form to a packed hall, be equipped with answers to all the awkward questions and deal with the fallout from other, more-senior grades.  Common sense now informs me the learning of nitty-gritty of ZNKR Jodo moves isn’t the be-all/end-all and it was rather foolish for me to have thought otherwise.  Sensei has made his decision and will take a watchful step back: a test to see if he’s manufactured a mindless robot or crafted a potential future instructor. 

So, like it or not, I’m going to be tested and, unlike being in a group parading up and down performing kihon or in pairs performing kata, there is nowhere to hide.

I’d rather have an opponent any day of the week.  Make that a dozen opponents.