MAMA: Adventures in Martial Arts and Motherhood

Today was field day in Maya's class which meant that all the first graders donned adorable t shirts they had decorated themselves and went off to our local park to play games and have a picnic together. Of course an event like this requires parent help, and I am a good mommy who has her mornings free so I volunteered. Well, I sort of volunteered. By that I mean I showed up at the school at 9, carried a bag of supplies, helped set up and led some parachute games for one of the groups. Then I taught another mom how to play cat and mouse and got on the subway to go to work, aka the dojo. The kids were split up into about 9-10 teams but I only managed to play with one of them before abandoning my post. The event was supposed to go until 1 or 2. I left at 11. I am a bad, bad mommy. I teach karate from 3-6 today. But I left the park at 11 because running parachute games for small children is actually one of the things I do for a living. I left at 11 so I could get to the dojo in ...

For the athletes in the room: Here is the status of my "injury". The MRI spaceflight showed two herniated discs in my cervical spine, causing a pinched nerve. For those of you not in the know (and who are the type of folks who like pointless medical info for your Tuesday night bar trivia), a herniated disc basically means that the fluid that is normally inside the discs in your spine has decided to push its way outside instead. My doctor described it like a jelly donut that has some of the jelly spurting out of the little hole in its side. (Yes, he said this. Perhaps he was hungry at the time.) This not so yummy jelly can push against nerves and cause pain, numbness, weakness, etc. He said this type of injury normally resolves itself on its own, with physical therapy and time. He said exercise is good. He also said I need to fix my terrible posture. And to stop looking down at my phone.  When I mentioned jiu-jitsu he said sure. But judging from his blank stare, I am pre...

I will admit that I can be a martial arts snob. Occasionally I meet a woman who is brand new to jiu-jitsu. She has that wide eyed, hyped up look; the one that says "OH MY GOD this is so so AWESOME, I cannot believe how awesome this is, I LOVE jiu-jitsu, I want to do it EVERY SINGLE DAY for the rest of my LIFE, it is THAT awesome!" She posts selfies with her sweaty face and f**ked up hair (#messyhairdon'tcare) with comments about how much she loves training (BJJ for life baby!) and all I can think is yeah, you're gonna be gone in a month.  It is not that I am not happy when new woman start training. Actually I am ecstatic. The more girls who wear gis the better. I wish every woman in the entire world would do martial arts. Any martial art will do, but I am particularly excited when the ladies start jiu-jitsu.  The thing is, most of ya'll are gonna quit. Actually most men who join a BJJ school are also going to quit, its just that there are much more of them so ...

No offense to the young men out there. (Not like any read this blog.) I am not saying all of you are bad. There are a few really nice 18-25 year old dudes who train at the dojo. I like them. But ya'll need to talk to this guy. He is making your kind look bad. Hey buddy, I get it. There aren't many opportunities in our cubicle society for you to get out there and "be a man". Like fight a mountain lion or slay a dragon or something that makes you feel important. You have a shitty entry level job where no one listens to you or cares that you exist. You keep talking about "joining the gym" but it is too expensive and takes too much time away from hanging on the corner with your buddies. And all you really want, all you really need is for someone, anyone to pay attention to you. So that explains why instead of riding your bike in a nice straight line in the bike lane like a normal person would, you preferred to zoom back and forth, on the sidewalk, where t...