It's Even Worse Today

Pay very close attention to the line that says, "Feels like: 109"

It felt really weird driving up to class last night. Different. I almost didn't want to go. For a while, I really wanted to just put my brown belt back on and go back to the way things were. James said he'd felt the same way.

When sensei started class, we both headed towards our usual spots at the beginning of the kyu line. Years of habit don't break overnight.

I finally broke down and watched the tape of my test. I'd been resisting watching it, because I knew it hadn't been one of my best days. I was right. I was very disappointed, both in the quality of the tape, and in the quality of my performance. The guy who was taping for me set the camera up behind all the spectators, so what he got on film was only from the waist up. Half a kata is the stances, and he didn't get any of that.

I'd said that my kata felt really weak, and it looked it too. Seisan looked pretty good, but they went downhill from there. I think it was a combination of nerves and the heat. I was so nervous that I was hoping the board didn't see my legs shaking. I said something to sensei about that, and he said the board understood that. If the board came to my home dojo and saw me working out on my turf, where I felt safe and confident, they would see a completely different person.

After doing kata--including weapons kata, and bunkai, we did self defense--again one at a time. Sensei did say that the board was very impressed with my self defense. We did 5 different self defense techniques--three with one attacker and two with two attackers at once. My two-on-one was with Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Eiffling. For the first one, Mr. Sullivan was on my left side and Mr. Eiffling was on my right. Mr. Sullivan went over to Mr. Eiffling to plan their moves. When he did that, I turned and ran the other way. It was kind of an impulsive move, and after I did it, I thought, "oh, no! I shouldn't have done that. I'm going to get in trouble for it." But I didn't. Mr. Dreher liked it and actually commended me for my thinking. He said, "You'd be amazed at how many times people on the street just don't think. Why let them get their plans together? She noticed their planning and got the heck out. That was very good."

The last thing we did was sparring. I've always felt my sparring was my weakest point, and it really showed. However, they don't judge so much on technique as on heart. If you don't give up, if you stay in there and give it all you've got, you'll do ok. Since there were so many of us testing, we only had to score two points on our opponents. We sparred 6 matches each, the last one being with our sensei. The first person I sparred was Carole. We'd been looking so forward to this, but I got my two points on her so quickly, we were both disappointed in how short the match was. My second match was with Sunshine, and it was over almost as quickly. But thennnn I had to spar Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Christensen. Those weren't over quite as fast...But they were really fun to spar. For my fifth match, I sparred Linde. I was really hesitant to hit her, because she'd posted to the Women's list once that because of her surgeries, a hard hit to just the right place could really do some serious damage. She was yelling, "HIT ME!" and I was thinking "Where????" I finally got some head shots and got my points, but I think that was the most difficult sparring match I had. My last match was sensei, and it was a spar until you drop match. No points. Just keep sparring as long as you can keep standing. Sensei wussed out on me. He just wouldn't come after me. It was frustrating to me, since I'm not that aggressive. I tend to respond in kind.

Finally, the test was over and the black belts and such adjourned to discuss the test and decide who to promote and who not to promote. After what seemed an interminable wait, the candidates were called back in and promotions were awarded. James was promoted first, and he was promoted to Jr. Shodan. Sensei had wanted him promoted to Shodan, and said he fought for that, but the board felt James had some maturity issues that needed to be worked out. I'm kind of glad they spotted that, because I knew it all along. I'd posted about it here. Then I was promoted to shodan, or first degree black belt. Mr. Dreher did the promotions, and he'd said that when he promoted someone his sensei should come and stand beside Mr. Dreher during the promoting. When he called my name, sensei was in another world, and didn't come forward. Mr. Dreher asked me, "Do you not have a sensei?" When sensei finally woke up and came forward, Mr. Dreher said, "For a minute, I though I was going to get to claim her." That would be both an honor and a privilege to be claimed by Mr. Dreher. He did give me a hug afterwards, and Mr. Worbington, too. Mr. Worbington hugged me, that is. He didn't hug Mr. Dreher.

Unfortunately, the knucklehead who was taping for me didn't tape my promotion, nor James' neither. I couldn't believe that! He got the other three testees, but not us. DUHHHHH! James' dad only taped James, so now there is no video record of my shodan promotion anywhere, unless Sunshine got it. That was the most disappointing thing of all.

Well, now I've got two years before I can be eligible for ni-dan, so I've got a long time to get things right.