Early martial arts
This photo was taken right after I finished testing for my green belt with brown tip, two steps away from black belt. My sister and first karate instructor, Pat Lemmon, are with me. My mother’s reflection is in the mirror. This was a hard test - I had to spar 3 people at one time!
I started my martial arts career like many boys raised in the 1980’s, in the karate movie section of my local video rental store. The flow of body movements, precise techniques and seemingly superhuman capabilities of “followers of the way” intrigued my early boyhood brain. Being a bit of a gangly youth, I frequently found my limbs operating as smoothly as a middle school band class flailing in uncoordinated concert. The idea of masterful control over one’s body attracted me to practice whatever I saw on whatever object I found. Chop this, HIYAA! Kick that, HUAAH. I was horribly uncoordinated but had the “eye of the tiger” in my eyes.
I begged my mother to sign me up for karate classes, but she refused for what seemed like a decade or more to my youthful mind, but finally I started karate classes at the age of 12. It was all I hoped! I got to spar an opponent, and later multiple opponents when I attained higher belts. Practicing katas, or forms, were the exact mix of precision and exercise that I needed to gather control of my gangly, unruly limbs. And the truly sweetest part, weapons class! Yes, my style taught a variety of weapons, including bo, nunchaku, sais, kama, tonfa and sword. I settled on the sais as my weapon of choice, and still have my first set of sais to this day.
I studied karate until the age of 16 when I developed knee issues. I played soccer on a competitive travel team, my high school soccer team, and I practiced karate, which meant I was kicking something six or seven days a week, sometimes for hours at a time. My youthful, still growing knees rebelled by painfully swelling up. During the third session of having one of my knees drained at the orthopedic surgeon’s office the doctor said to me, “You know, you need to choose one sport or the other or your knees won’t hold up.” Since I was on the varsity soccer team and a competitive travel soccer team, I chose soccer and put my karate career on hold, expecting to restart it after high school. By then I was only six months away from testing for my black belt, but I was resolved to return and finish.
However, the fates of small businesses were aligned against me when my karate school closed its doors leaving no other schools in the area teaching that style of karate (Goju Shorin). No karate black belt for me! Through martial arts at a young age, I gained confidence, focus and self-control, which allowed me to not only tame my unruly limbs but also my hormonal, emotional teenage self.
