Martial Arts?

I just learned my yes dears: yes dear you're right dear, yes dear right away dear and yes dear right away dear. Other than that I just curl up and take my beating. Martial arts, oh sorry, I thought it was marital arts.
Don't tell my wife I said that.

 

I thought MA stood for Manual of arms... like the MA colt 1911 or MA 12 gague shotgun....

 

Im schooled in the art of not likeing to get my a$$ kicked. Im no professional fighter but ive been in a few scrapes. Ive found out that the bigger they are the harder they will fall, but the bigger they are they generally hit harder! A swift kick to the groin will take most guys down(if it dont id start running). Ive also found out if you are aproached by a few guys, and you can drop one in the first hit it makes the others kinda question weather they want to fight. Also found out a good hard right, right in the ol snotbox(nose) will take alotta fight out of a guy( try getting hit in the nose it hurts!!!). Now like i said im not trained in any martial arts nor am i a pro fighter. I dont go out planning to fight but am not afraid to defend myself.if i had the recources closer i would take classes for mma. We do however have boxing gloves and me and the guys do spar.

 

My martial arts involve three feet of steel, although I practice with weighted wood.

 

I remember a quiet Indian kid, in high school, who impressed me. He was attacked and did his best to walk away (as I was taught), but the hard a$$ kept coming. My friend jumped on his chest with both feet, grabbed his coat collar, jack knifed off his chest while falling backwards, and threw his attacker completely over him . Lands feet first on his attacker's chest., and kicks off. He didn't even mess his combed and oiled hair. To this day, I don't know how he did it, and I was there.

 

Those are some of the most unbelievable moments, and if someone else told you about it, you'd call them a liar, 'cause it can't be possible. I've seen a few, so I won't, but I know the feeling.

 

I was involved in a blind rage incident where I picked a man a little larger than me off the ground by the neck. He came at me and that was the last thing I remembered. Someone had to tell me what happened. I avoid direct conflict ever since that episode.

 

That's actually one of the best reasons to study a martial art. I was very given to blind rages as a youngster. I had a much larger (6 foot five, in the tenth grade), older brother, who delighted in picking on me. I don't mean little things; he did things quite capable of hospitalizing me. Physically resisting him on an equal playing field was near to impossible, as I barely came up to his breast bone. So, I got mean. He would push me to the limit of my self control, and I would fly into a blind rage and try my best to kill him. At this point, he would usually run for all he was worth. Quite a few times, he didn't flee quickly enough. I got him in the spine with a ball peen hammer once. I thought I'd finished him off that time. I got him in the back of the head with a glass 32 oz coke bottle (back when they were glass) one time. That put him down for almost an hour. He wasn't right for the rest of the day after that one.

Anyway, the blind rages followed me into adulthood, as did the tendency to pick up whatever was at hand and knock the devil out of whomever was annoying me, or grabbing them by the throat and pounding them until someone dragged me off of them. I started studying karate in my early twenties, and the temper and rages went away. I would still get angry, but in a calm, calculating manner. I think it is because martial arts offer you many options when dealing with a physical encounter. It is no longer necessary to beat someone into unconsciousness in order to subdue them. You can decide upon the level of response you wish to use.

 

At 62 I'm still in pretty fair shape but I doubt I could handle martial arts without hurting myself. Soemtimes I feel like I could do anything and at other times I'm pretty sure I can't. I may try to get one ofmy granddaughters interested.

 

Honestly, I believe it is just a matter of finding the right art and the right school. At my school, the senior is instructor is seventy-eight, and I'm pretty sure he could kill me without looking up from his lunch. All of the black-belts of the school are required to teach. There are probably thirty-five instructor black-belts there and, of those, there are at least twenty of them who are sixty and over. One of my favorite instructors is a retired physics teacher who had never walked into a martial arts school until he was in his late forties, and had already had both knees replaced. That was his answer to his doctor's advise that he just get used to the idea that he wasn't going to be able to do some of the things that he used to do. He and his wife (a retired French teacher) are both fifth degree black-belts now. A large percentage of the students didn't start studying martial arts until they were in their forties and fifties, and many were older than that. They were retired, and finally had the time to do some of the things that they had always wanted to do.

Our senior instructor even encourages folks, young and old, with physical disabilities to attend classes. One fellow has a degenerative muscle disease, and needs a walker to steady himself on the floor. Our instructor's thought is that everyone can benefit from some facet of the training. It's not a competition. Everyone is on their own track.

I'm not saying that all schools are like this. Many, perhaps most, decidedly are not; but there are a lot of good instructors out there, and there are a lot of good schools out there. It takes a desire to learn, a commitment to try, and some time to find the right school. Don't immediately discard the idea of beginning a study of martial arts just because of your age or physical condition. Most of us folks with our younger years behind us have already got the mean, grumpy thing going for us. With a little bit of training, we can be downright scary.

 

There are three schools in my area. The very least I could do is go and watch a class and talk to the instructor.

 

All true. I see martial arts as a layer of preparedness though; just like any other prep. All of my plans are toward bugging in. I have a difficult time realistically imagining a situation that would cause me, in my situation, to bug out. But, I have two bug out bags packed and stowed, just in case. In my mind, the value in any prep is that it provides me with options. I like options. That's why I have layers of food stocks, and layers of physical security. "Plan A" may not always work.

I'd much prefer to shoot an attacker, but learning what is possible for me to do with my hands offers me options for consideration. That knowledge, like many of my preps, is something I hope to never need, but it's comforting to have.

 

Good for you. I neglected to mention in my earlier post that when my wife and I began studying at our current school, one of our first instructors, a soon to be junior black belt, was a lady about my age. She had moved to the area some years before, after her husband had retired from the military, and had begun taking her granddaughter to karate class. She sat and watched for a couple of years before the instructor lured her out onto the floor. When we started there, she had been studying for seven years, and was preparing for her black belt test. Maybe you can take your granddaughters, and see what you think about the idea.

Take a look at my earlier posts on this thread, if you haven't already. I gave a brief description of various arts, as best I could. Not all arts are the same, to say the least. Unless you are an unusually fit sixty-two year old, I would stay away from Tae Kwon Do and look for a Okinawan/Japanese art, or maybe Tai Chi. I studied Tae Kwon Do for several years when I was younger, but about all I could do now on the floor of a Tae Kwon Do Do-jang would be to embarrass myself. My current school, a Shorin Ryu Do-jo, is a perfect fit for me at my age and level of fitness - no high kicks, a varied curriculum, and a heavy emphasis on weapons.

 

I would suggest staff work. Anyone can use a walking stick, anywhere, without raising people's eyes, but it can be quite effective as both sword and shield. it can strike from either end, and faster than your fists can move due to leverage. And serve as a mobile shield for anything coming in at you.