Worse than tests.

Tests are a chance to showcase techniques. What goes on at tests, though, is often more about nerves than it is techniques. Perhaps, if we were being picky, it would be more accurate to say it's about techniques in the midst of nerves. Either way, nerves have a lot to do with it. The thing about nerves is that the bruises and scars they leave last much longer than those of punches and kicks.

At tests, uke and nage both get both kinds of bruises and scars.

The upcoming test is now the most-recently-passed test. I took--this is an estimate, of course--about two-hundred falls. Add another fifty or hundred to that for the class and free practice before the test. And, I'm not saying that all didn't hurt; quite the opposite, it hurts right now down the whole length of my legs, arms, and back. I think there's a bump forming on the back of my head. Something's wrong with two or three of my fingers, and there's probably more to come as my body continues its conversations with me. Much more painful were the few genuine goofs committed.

The goofs hurt both those who pulled them and me, watching them. They took the forms of lapses in etiquette, mistakes in technique, and a simple social faux pas. You try to teach them better; they try to learn. You both cringe when what was more than adequate preparation turns out to have been just not enough. This post has turned out morose, when my overriding feeling of the day is actually satisfaction: about a dozen friends went through a trial today, and they handled themselves, on balance, with grace, poise, and skill. Be it a sin or not, I am proud of them. That's no small joy... There's just no ibuprofen for regret.

No one is safe.

Eight mudansha, junior students to prepare for tests right now. Theirs is the present toll on my body. If I weren't so fond of these truly, very good friends, I wouldn't be offering myself up to the degree I have been. Despite my high regard for them, despite only wanting the best for them, and despite the fact that I am supposedly helping them to learn how not to be hurt, sometimes, I injure them. The evidence:

And in that picture, the bruise is only about twelve hours old. It's already half the length of her arm and approximately the color you imagine when you think of an ulcer. She doesn't remember when it might have happened, nor what exactly might have done it. It's going to get bigger, darker, and more sensitive to touch before it starts to heal, when it will get even uglier. Yellow, purple, spotty and raised. Still, she showed up for three hours of class the next morning, ready to practice again the test that left this mark on her the night before. Tough, persistent, and further developing both of those qualities every day: this is a big part of budo, embodied.

A lot.

Thus far, I've enjoyed thirteen years of aikido, including five distinct styles, six different dojo, and more seminars than I presently care to count. In that time, the following injuries have come my way: a torn knee ligament; a twice-broken nose; a dislocated finger; mat-burn to the point of bleeding from the knees, heels, toes, knuckles, and face; a chipped tooth; a black eye; a couple slight sprains of the wrists; innumerable relatively-minor bruises and cuts; and no small amount of damage to the ego. To be certain, there is more, happily forgotten, for now.

This sounds, perhaps, like a lot. But I train a lot: three hours a day; six days a week. Compared to the peril, violence, and plain-old accidents of normal life (car wrecks; potato peelers; drunk guys and psychos) it's not a bad ratio for what some might describe as a part-time job in a full-contact sport. Tonight, however, I've reached an ignoble impasse. Tonight I suffer pain I cannot blame on any particular strike, joint-lock, or throw. Tonight I am, simply, sore. It hurts to stand. And walk. Even breathing must be done in proper measure. (Almost) worse than the pain is the mystery of its source. I've been putting forth a little extra effort lately, and I am more often industrious and athletic on the mat than I am lazy. Yet, though I can't single out any specific recent training for blame, my body feels pushed to a more dire limit than I remember it previously knowing. Wisdom teeth surgery sore. Disastrous teenage romance sore. Santa Claus truth sore.

Maybe it's the eight soon-to-test nage for whom I am presently designated uke, and their attendant preparation. Maybe the years are catching up to me even worse than I'd suspected. Maybe, rather than writing and complaining, I should have just gone to bed, instead, but tonight I feel impelled to begin a long-ruminated project, participating in that dubious literary tradition of sharing my pain with the world, and so I begin this blog of just how much aikido hurts.