Still Here

I know I have not written much on this blog lately and haven’t made many updates. I thought when I retired from the police department and opened another and larger dojo full-time that I would be able to spend some time writing. In fact, I did manage to start 4 different books but I also decided that I wanted to go back to college. I enrolled in a university and pursued an education degree that took way more of my time then I thought. That was probably because I decided to pursue a dual major earning a bachelors in education and special education and then kept going to get a Masters, and I am almost to my PHD. I have managed to get out a post here and there and the dojo ran strong until COVID and now we are down to a few dedicated members training, but that is ok I prefer quality over quantity. 

This year is my 47th year training in Okinawa Gojuryu and after all this time I am looking at where I am in budo. I rarely attend tournaments anymore, simply because I dislike the political squabbling between the groups. I attend the occasional seminar here in the states. I just don’t seem to have a desire to follow the crowd anymore. I have some friends that I have known for my entire karate life that I don’t really see anymore because I tend to stay away from the tournaments. I ran into an old friend not too long ago that made a comment; “I didn’t know you were still around, let alone training.” I had to chuckle because if you ask my wife, I am always doing karate or juijitsu. I told my friend that these days, I prefer to spend my time training with my sons, teaching my students and traveling to Okinawa. I still teach at least 3 days a week and I still train 5 days a week not at my dojo. I have continued to train consistently since 1977 with very few interruptions, really only a few days here or there once to recover from foot surgery (but I was still in the dojo teaching from a chair), to recover from Kidney stones and more recently for a radical cancer surgery (but I still made it to the chair to keep a watchful eye). 

Just because one does not support the establishment (local karate organizations) it doesn’t mean their karate is subpar. Just because you don’t train at a large fancy martial arts school doesn’t mean you’re not getting good training. Some of the best dojo in the world are found in small out of the way areas in Okinawa and only have about 10 people training. The past few years have have enjoyed quietly training, going to Okinawa, enjoying my grandchildren, teaching those that want to learn and being a student again. Now I am happy that I am still alive and once I recover from my latest surgery will be back on the mat doing what I always do.