You get to see the sun rise over the water every day, and relax in the cool breeze coming off the mountains.
I’m sorry it took so long for me to get here, some things came up along the way, and I wound up taking a slight detour.
I know its been a while.
My hair?
I’ve been doing the long hair for a few years now, I don’t think you would even recognize me anymore.
I imagine you still prefer the crew cut, but here I am.
Here we are under this cherry tree.
Together in this moment of all moments.
I remember the stars, just being able to look up and be in their presence, that and the cold of that December night. You never met him but he was my best friend from High School, and the guy who I did everything with: skateboarding, the band, our comic book.
Was I surprised when he tried to sell me on martial arts that night?
It was another thing to do, another adventure together.
Something fun to do.
He was good at the action and drama but not the follow-though, so we spend most of the day wandering around looking for a martial art school. Somebody who he couldn’t remember knew of a school that was somewhere around here, so all we had to do was find it.
It was no wonder that we passed by it a few times and it was only once we were across the street that we saw it, the school being on the second floor of the building with a walk-up on the side of the building. Triumphant, he proclaimed this was the start of our journey as we climbed the stairs to arrive at a platform by the entrance.
Locked.
We didn’t account for he fact that it was closed for the winter break and New Year with classes resuming next week. At least it wasn’t a total loss, as we took some flyers from a box by the door. Flipping thought them, the school was actually a martial art center, with a few different school and styles operating under one roof.
Different days of the week, different classes, and different martial arts styles.
Did you every consider that?
The odds of both of us walking into the same class on the same night?
Of all the schools, and all the classes it could have been?
I did.
I was surprised when he stopped by next week and said tonight was the night to visit a class, I figured he had already moved on to the next attempt. I remember the flier he was holding for that particular class, his criteria for selection over the others was the picture of the martial arts guy on the front of it.
When we walked into the dojo that Wednesday night that first impression wasn’t quite what we were expecting. The room was empty, and nobody was at the front desk.
Judging from the pile of shoes by the door and coats on the rack, somebody was here, and something was going on behind one of the doors on the other side of the room as you could her people, more specifically bodies moving around.
Before we could change our minds the door opened and the doorway was filled with a rather large man who asked if we had an appointment.
After introduction on my part we were invited to sit and watch a class.
There in that room, a dozen or so men punching and kicking each other, in that moment I knew that this is what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, that this was the place I needed to be.
This way my path.
From that moment forward everything else in my life became secondary.
When class ended and the teacher came over to talk to us, I asked to become his student right then and there.
Class was on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday nights.
On Monday, Thursday, and Friday I met up and practiced with the senior students in the dojo, and on Sunday once a month there was a seminar to attend.
This on top of my own training every day where I practiced in the park across from the dojo.
My life was martial arts and I was happy.
Truly happy.
The dojo was small, maybe about ten of us, and in those four years I established myself as a dedicated deshi and was often the one used as uke by the teacher in each class.
Often I was given the honor to sit at my teachers left side.
Then something happened, there was a shift that changed my world.
I can’t say what, perhaps a movie, or a book, something I the news, but all of a sudden more and more people started coming to the dojo. Class doubled from the ten of us, filled the back studio room, and expanded to the front studio room.
Ten grew to around forty, and it was now common to have people visiting to watch a class every week as opposed to once every few months.
Most of the new students I didn’t even know or get a chance to really train with as they were gone in a few weeks, a rotating door of people who left no impression.
Imagine my surprise that first time you just walked up to me and without saying a word and threw the first punch.
The first time I saw you
It was before your first class, you were sitting on the bench in the hallway dressed in your uniform perfectly pressed and tied, the belt square around your waist. Your hair was pulled back, your eyes were closed, and there was a presence about you. Something in the space, other-worldly, mysterious.
Beautiful for sure, but something else beyond that.
The first time I saw you?
That was a bit later.
During practice in class it was the silence that existed between us and what was communicated through that when we practiced together.
There would be conversation with the others students, observations of movement, maybe even a joke or two, but between us nothing was said. I think the others viewed it as focus or seriousness, I think the senior student of the dojo noticed the truth.
We were communicating to each other through our movement together.
Punches, locks, and throws became something else.
I think you must have been watching me for some time and if I wasn’t so focused on training maybe I would have noticed sooner.
Was it a really just a casual invitation from you to grab something to eat before class, when we both just happened to arrive early for class that night?
What did I feel when we sat down across from each other at the Japanese restaurant?
Clumsy.
Uncoordinated.
Exposed.
Sitting there it felt like all of my grace and coordination of movement from the martial arts had left me, while your posture was perfect, every movement with the ohashi polished and deliberate.
I felt mismatched as if I stood out in the restaurant, dressed in my leather jacket, jeans, and boots, contrasted against your gray suit, white shirt, black shoes, and pulled back hair.
I was uncomfortable with the situation, and with myself.
Not with you.
This was the first time since you joined the dojo, in that brief dinner together, that I learned a bit more about you. I knew you were from California and that you moved here to work in finance in the city from what I overheard in class.
I didn’t know you were a vegetarian and abstained from alcohol. I’m sorry you had to explain it to me, I genuinely didn’t know what a vegetarian was- nobody I knew at the time was that.
Observing you eat perfectly, that is when I suspected that there was something more to you then just interest in the martial arts.
I think our first dinner together revealed a lot about each other.
+++
Do you remember the tea ceremony after class?
All of the cups on the shelf, we each had our own cup and spot on the shelf.
Sitting in the circle as the teacher prepared the tea and poured it to to each student.
As the assistant, I was always the last to sit in the circle, wherever I could find a space, and when ever I found a space somehow you were always across from me.
Did you think I didn’t notice that?
I always wondered how you were able to do that.
As the teacher answered questions your posture, your presence never changed. You just watched and listened to the quality of that circle and who was really present.
The first time?
Did I remember?
It was after that one particular class when we all went out to the Japanese restaurant around the corner to hear stories about the old days, the surprise and the composure of the restaurant staff as the class ot about 30 poured in and filled half the restaurant.
As was my place and responsibility I took the seat closest to the door, and furthest away from the teacher, the worst place to sit, and when I looked for you, there you were somehow across from me.
When we placed our orders, the senior student made a casual recommendation for me to try the miso soup, and I missed reading the room and politely declined that it wasn’t my thing.
When pressed by him in jest why, I don’t know why I stood my ground and refused the offer.
Sometimes I was stubborn.
Sometimes I was stupid.
Often I was a combination of both.
When some of the other students wondered what the commotion was about, it quickly became a question of what would it take to get me to try the soup.
Now I couldn’t back down, and there was no way out.
Then you quietly asked if I would try the soup for you?
Without hesitation I said yes.
That was the first time I saw you smile.
On the walk back to the dojo from the restaurant, when you asked for my number, you didn’t see it but that was the first time that I smiled.
Uchi-deshi
When the teacher sat down next to me after class, at first I thought I was in trouble given the serious look on his face and the formality with which he sat down.
Did he know?
A few others must have noticed it also as their conversations paused for a moment to listen out of curiosity with what was about to happen..
There was an opening in the dojo for an uchi-deshi, a live in student, and after he outlined the responsibility and that it was either all or nothing with regard to that obligation.
He was extending that opportunity to me, and needed an answer before I left for the evening.
He got my answer right away and without hesitation.
A few of the other students came over to congratulate me as you kept your distance, and when the dojo was empty enough you sat down next to me. Nothing needed to be said as I knew if I had declined the opportunity you would have made sure otherwise and straightened me out.
That pause in your posture, that slight nod from you, you never knew that confidence that it gave me when I moved into the dojo.
I know you didn’t see us as he asked me what was going on after class when you were in the changing room. It wasn’t because he was a loud mouth and would have told everybody in the dojo, but because he wouldn’t’ have understood.
I could barely understand.
That is why I was silent on it when he asked, it was the only way I could respond.
How do I explain our relationship?
That is the first time I ever said that, because it was true, even if the definition could not capture it.
How do I explain the presence of the space that exists between us?
How do I explain the gravity and stillness that exists when we are together?
Why would I want to trade that for what he was asking?
How do I explain that when we would talk at night on the phone for hours each week, before we hung up the phone, we would go outside and pick a star in the sky together.
This is why I was silent when you opened up to me in that moment and told me that you had really come from California to follow your guru.
I never asked or pressed for more details as what was there to ask?
I understood the gravity of a path and what that commitment demands.
Thursday night
The dojo was my temple, and Thursday night was my inner sanctuary.
That was the night was when I handled the paperwork at the dojo, returned any inquiries and cleaned the place. After that was done at 10 PM the dojo was all mine for another hour.
Alone for that hour with nobody else around to practice in total silence.
Just as I was about to lock the door and start practice I head somebody coming up the stairs and pause at the door.
Hesitation?
I had no idea who it could have been.
When it opened, there you were, just as you always were.
Perfectly dressed.
Perfectly poised.
Perfectly controlled.
I was surprised and I didn’t want to say anything, but I did wonder how you knew I was here at night.
Nobody outside of the teacher and senior student knew.
You asked if I wanted to practice with you for a bit.
Yes.
The dojo, this world, was just ours for the night.
When you stepped out on the mat and bowed in, it was…different.
No teacher setting the technique for us. No other students to practice around, no expectations or outcome.
Just the silence and rhythm of our bodies.
When we finished I could see that you wanted to ask me something, so I didn’t ask and gave the feeling space to expand.
You wanted to know if you could share something with me from your world.
Would I be open to it?
Did I trust you?
Would I be able to just sit and breathe without any expectations?
Sitting down next to you, to your right, I closed me eyes and just breathed as you instructed me before the room got quiet and went silent.
We we leaving the world of martial arts, my world, and entering your world.
Was I supposed to feel something?
Was something supposed to happen?
I knew you were just a foot or so away from me, but I felt nothing.
It was only once my mind stopped talking to me that I noticed it.
A scent in the room.
Presence given a scent.
You.
When we opened our eyes and you turned to face me I could see you were observing me.
A discernment in you that surprised me, as I had not seen that before.
As if you were waiting for me to tell you something, but I remained quiet.
There was no need to say anything.
No need for any kind of reponse.
That was the second time that I saw you smile.
The night that didn’t end
It was now almost midnight and even if I wasn’t your sempai in the dojo, I wouldn’t let you wait at the train station alone.
So there we were in my car, just talking about martial arts, books, and movies as train after train passed by, until the last train for the night arrived and left without you on it.
It was snowing now, and I offered to drive you home, it wasn’t an offer but more of an instance.
At first I wondered what you were doing, the directions you gave me to the house were not quite right.
I’ve lived around here my entire life, if you just told me the house was near the library I could have been there in twenty minutes tops.
You had me driving in circles for an hour.
Surprised?
I didn’t correct you as I had hoped it was the for the same reason, but didn’t want to say it just in case I was wrong.
That you didn’t want the night to end.
I would have kept driving until the gas ran out.
I should have handled it differently and even now I’m still angry at myself for it.
When we pulled up to your house, the ashram with the other students, it was almost 3 in the morning and the house was completely dark.
Conversation abruptly stopped, you announced that you had to go, and I let you get out without saying anything.
I wanted to walk you to the door to make sure you got in safe and OK but…
The fact that I just stayed in the car shouted against everything I was and had become.
Fighting it, something had told me to stay put and just watch to make sure you got in the house.
Just. Stay. In. The. Car.
You slowly walked across the snow, up the porch and through that door to that dark house without ever looking back.
And then you were gone
At Saturday’s class when we bowed in at the dojo, and turned to partner up, you weren’t there.
How could you not be there?
Something must have happened and you had to stay at work, or maybe you weren’t’ feeling well.
Maybe you were just late from missing your train and would walk in at any moment.
You never missed a class.
We never missed a class.
The teacher waited till most of the students had left and we had a quiet corner of the dojo together, and that is when he told me.
That you had left the dojo to follow your guru back to California.
That you would not be coming back to the dojo.
That was that.
That was to totality of the explanation I received.
It was a year later when the phone rang and I knew right away it was you.
Your voice was distant, far, and flat.
You tried to hide it, but I it was me you were talking to.
I noticed it right away.
I didn’t ask you what was going on because I was happy to just be talking with you again about martial arts, book, and movies, to just spend some time together again.
When it slipped and you realized that I realized the difference you hung up.
We never got to pick out a star together.
You know I tried to find you, and I’m sorry I was angry at you with my silence for so long.
It took a while for me to realize about capacity, that sometimes regarding certain situations there is only so much capacity.
That sometimes something is beautiful because it is impossible.
It wasn’t until much later that I found out, which is what makes our time together all the more beautiful.
Nothing lasts as it is
It was a few years after you left.
I remember looking out the dojo window during a pause in class when the teacher came over to me and told me that one day all of this won’t be here.
I thought he was crazy.
The dojo had been here for forever.
Classes each week, seminars, training all the time, the Japanese restaurant, the park across the street, all of it.
He said just like that the dojo won’t be here one day, that nothing lasts as it is, but rather changes, and that was the lesson he was trying to teach us each week.
How to exist in that change.
That I needed to learn that.
What I want to say
I guess what I am trying to say I should just come out and say, but if I say it that means its final, no matter how I wish it could still be different.
What I want to say is: here is what I saw, here is what I felt, and here is what I remember about a woman.
You existed.
You mattered.
Someone remembers you with gentleness, and that you had the presence and heart of a warrior.
For her.
For the three months that mattered more than either of us understood at the time.
For the silence we shared, the stillness we recognized in each other, and the presence that shaped us long after our paths diverged.
I have to go now.
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