Underneath my yellow skin

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I fucking did it!

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My Taiji teacher has the flu, so no class today. That meant I did my solo practice, and halfway through, I decided, why the fuckk not? I had one posture left in the Double Fan Form. I had planned on teaching the last posture to myself on Sunday (tomorrow), but I decided why the hell not do it today? It was the closing posture, and it was a bit more complicated than other closing postures.

Today, I took a deep breath and watched the video of it several times. May I say once again how much I appreciate the one video where she is doing the form facing both front and back side by side? It’s so valuable to see both perspectives at the same time. Most videos show the teacher facing the camera, which messes with my brain. I much prefer seeing it from the back, but I like having the front view so I can check angles I can’t see from the back.

It also helps to have it at half speed. Then, the second video I watch is at .75 speed. The third video is at normal speed. I don’t know why this works for my brain, but it does. I need the variety of teachings in order for my brain to truly understand what is going on. Even still, there were a few times when I despaired I would ever learn the whole form.

I started teaching myself this form on my (actual) birthday. Now, just a bit over eight months later (minus a month of getting over my three-shot day, so a little over seven months), I can say that I have taught myself the whole Double Fan Form. I am pleased, of course, but also too tired* to really feel much.

I cannot believe it; I really can’t. I had a Zoom lesson with my teacher on Thursday. Zoom because she has the flu, of course. I was telling her that I was so close to finishing the Double Fan Form and how fucking hard it was, and she said she would like me to do it at the demo (in February).

I said not this year, but maybe next–and I meant it! I do not feel ready to do it in two months, but in a year and two months? Yes, maybe I would be ready. It might fulfill my desire to perform, too, which would be an added bonus. The problem is that I get performance anxiety, which I used to do when I was performing on the regular a few decades ago.  It’s hard not to go on tilt once I let it get to me, which then just makes everything worse.

I’m really proud of myself, I’ll be honest with you. Though it took twice the amount of time I thought it would–shit, more than twice–it was…worth it? I’m not sure I can say that. As I said to my teacher, I would not have done it if I had known what it meant back when I started, but I’m glad to have done it now.


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Dancing with my weapons

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I’m living  that weapons life. I never thought I’d love anything* as much as I love my weapons. Ian and I were talking about getting new tats, which I haven’t done in decades. Before, I always thought I’d get one more and it would be a tree of life with a woman’s figure and face on my left hip/thigh. I wanted to wait until I reached a point in my life where I felt, if not good about myself, then at least neutral. I’m not there; I may never be. I have reached the point where I no longer passionately hate myself, though, so, yay?

Anyway, in talking with Ian, I realized that I no longer wanted that tattoo. It no longer represents what I want from life or who I am. I still think fondly of it, but it’s not what I want right now. If I were to get a tattoo, it would have to reflect my passion for weapons. I tried to find an image of what I wanted, but it’s very difficult to find non-cheesy tats when it comes to Asian shit because of all that mystical Orient bullshit. I would have my tattooist draw it themselves, obviously, but it would be helpful to have concrete image to give them so they could go off it.

What I want is someone similar to me in body shape and size, maybe with the face shaded out. Then, doing a weapon posture. The one I immediately thought of was the current one I’m learning with the staff/spear. I’ll see if I can describe it. You stand in the standard bow position with one foot forward and the other back and to the side. The back foot is turned outwards 45 degrees while the front foot is pointed forward. The position I want is the figure to be weighted on the back foot with the front of the staff pointed down and the back end held up high. My initial idea was to have the rest of the weapons I love depicted around the figure in a circle. However, as I was typing this, another idea hit me. The same figure with each of the weapons doing a different posture/movement. I could have them all around my body or maybe in the same area, such as my thigh or my back.

Of course, this is all academic for now. There is no way in hell I’m getting a tattoo any time in the near future given the situation of *waves hand at world around*.


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Knives in is better than Knives Out

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I hated Knives Out as I mentioned in my two-part review. In part because it didn’t have enough bladed weapons, even though admittedly it was a tiny part of the reason. This is just a clever way for me to say that I love weapons. A lot. This is not news to anyone who knows me, but the depth of my passion might be. Except to my taiji teacher. She is well-used to me gushing about some weapon or the other. I appreciate her patience because she is not a weapons person herself. She doesn’t dislike them, I don’t think, but she’s at best neutral about them.

One consequence of my training is that I have become a ‘well, actually’ person when it comes to weaponry that I know. I mean, it’s not unusual. I hate movies with psychologists in them because they break SO MANY LAWS. Similarly, taiji in most movies is just people waving their hands in the air. I watched Truly, Madly, Deeply with Alan Rickman in it, and there’s a scene in which he is playing the cello. I love Alan Rickman immensely, and he did a decent job of mimicking a cellist, but it was obvious he didn’t really play.

So, yeah, it’s not unusual that I wince when I see weapons-play in movies or TV. I remember when Game of Thrones was a thing. There was a scene between Arya Stark and Brienne of Tarth that had everyone online raving about it. Especially ‘girl power’ and that kind of thing. I finally watched the clip, and I was underwhelmed. The two actors did the best with what they were giving, but the whole thing was ludicrous. Let’s start with the constant clashing of swords. Look. If you have a pointy-stabby thing in your hand, you’re not looking to clash it against another pointy-stabby thing. You’re looking to point and stab it into a soft bit. This is not rocket science. In addition, the wild swinging and slashing is both wasted energy expended and leaving yourself open to an attack.


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