I heard an old song, and old situational feelings just flooded me. I can smell the hot sun, I can smell my old Geo Tracker and see the places I went, I can FEEL them. I can feel the desolation of the time.

That was it.. I was emotionally desolate. 

I knew it. I knew I was terribly adrift, and I was swimming like mad. I just didn't know where to go. 

Strange, that I affected the same makeup style then, as I do now (though less of it then) and these hands are the same that gripped the steering wheel, as I drove from class to class.. I was troubled, I was verifiably mad. I didn't understand how dangerous I was, or how much danger, I was in.

Now, I am sure that I was like so many other martial artists, not sure what they were pursuing, but pursuing by damn. 

Me, I was looking for someone, or something, that "got me". 

Meanwhile, I was too focussed, and closed, to let anything in. 

It's been a process, and these hands typing this post, are becoming more spotted & wrinkled in the quest, and the limbs aching & mangled, but I feel far more "gotten" these days, in my training with koryu, than I ever felt in aikido or judo. 

My first taste of SMR & genuine iai, I was completely destroyed, and I remember driving around the neighborhood of the dojo where I had helped orchestrate the seminar. 

I was actually in tears. 

I wanted to do THIS THING.

I came to a place where I just looked, and knew what it was, I am here to do. 

I need to handle weapons, I need to be good at it, and I need to have minimal risk in its application.  

I've never mentioned it, or discussed it.. my evening after class of driving around sobbing my heart out. I didn't think it was anyone's business, what I really wanted to do. If I wanted to do it enough, I would simply go do it. It was over a decade ago, now. 

There are those who claim (my former teachers among them) that the risk of injury, is the teaching tool. I've been lucky, but I've got one more ligament left in my left shoulder, and had problems in my left wrist only the most advanced of my Rolfing colleagues could solve (and did, in 15 minutes in one class) at this point, no one gets to twist me, or throw me, unless I know them very well, and know they can save me. Short list. 

I won't train with anyone who thinks that injuring me, is a useful training tool. I don't have any more room for injury, and people who train like that are psychopaths. Not interested. 

I am pretty sure, that I don't understand much about this process, except that it can, and should be, constructive. 

I am not willing to stop. 

The trick is, finding my way. 

Now, to the dreams of the late 90s, sure to find me in restless sleep tonight.