Saturday, November 1, 2008

Shodan Test

Where to begin? This morning I woke up and I couldn't breathe at all out of my nose and was sore as could be from yesterday. I took a hot shower to break up some of the congestion and later realized I was running a fever. It would not have been bad at all except that it's one of those fevers that just suck the strength right out of you. We had a morning Aikido class at 9am and the rank test demonstrations were at 2:30. I started stretching around 1 and working out with Patrick (my uke for my test and I was his uke for his). We drilled through the kata a few times and I was soooo tired. At the actual test though, I pushed through it and fell fine for Patrick and felt energized. I definitely wasn't at my "A" game today but passed my test anyway. My favorite part was during a demonstration of Nijusan (the 23) I either stepped awkward, or didn't get the right push from Patrick, well SOMETHING happened that changed our relationship while we were moving and it ended in a cool throw that happened just by me following the motion. It was very Aiki like. Andy tested for his Ikkyu rank and I think his Nijusan demonstration went better than mine. The highlight of the day was when Pat was shaking my hand and said "here, I've got something for you" and gave me HIS black belt. It's WAY too large for me, but full of his Ki to be sure :) I was flabbergasted and didn't know what to say. I was quite honored and still am a little taken aback from it. Pat's wife Elise Parker took pictures of the days events and as soon as she's done burning cd's of it I can post them here. She took over 1000 photos though so you'll get the highlights. If you'd like to see the WHOLE thing, check out my facebook page. Shortly after class all my energy left me again and I need it back soon. I move for Washington (state) in 2 days and will continue my Aikido education with Thomas Sheehey. It feels weird being a Shodan (and I know everyone says that) but I guess I thought I'd be the first to have some epiphany after putting the belt on. Maybe next rank :)

6 comments:

Scott Zrubek said...

Congratulations!

Good luck with the move and may you find an aikido environment as welcoming as Pat's appears to be.

John Wood said...

Thanks...me too :)

The Nerd-storian! said...

Congrats to you on your shodan. Tapping back from the blog thanks!

mommykarate said...

Yay John! Too bad you weren't feeling well, but it sounds like you did just fine. For me the epiphany came about a year later. It's very overwhelming at first, but keep training!

congratultions, fellow MA blogger!

karrie

somaserious said...

Last comment was from me, using another sign in name. Oops....

John Wood said...

It's been almost a year and no sudden epiphany yet. I only made it to Sensei Sheehy's place once but I've been regularly teaching at the YMCA for months now. It's a real experience trying to teach new people Aikido who have NO knowledge of martial arts previously. Demonstrating things has been a chore from time to time, but in explaining things to them I've learned SO much in how I perceive motions.