SWEET VIOLE(ts)NCE

"Serenity was the vessel where violence could be stored."

         Norman Mailer

         The Fight

Reggie thinks the boxing workout is violent.  I prefer to call it high intensity, or high impact.  Yeah, ok, it's violent, but it's somehow violent without being violent.  Even when I'm throwing all my mental and physical power into a punch it doesn't feel violent, because there's no rage.  I think that's the key, and it's going to be illuminating to see if there can be sparring - hitting another person - and have it not feel violent because the rage is not there.

Workout last week  - lots of punching.  These are the workouts I like best.  I like the cardio and conditioning because keeping up is a challenge.  Pushing it to, or near my max, but it's the punching that keeps me coming back.  It's that beautiful *SMACK* when the glove sounds against the bag, or shield, and for that split second you can see the punch connect, and feel the force move through your body to the bag, and back again.  A split second.  It's a shot of bliss.

HAIKU FOR COACH ARCARO

Heavy-bag workout

I snap a right like lightening

Bliss, laughter and bliss

Gloves and shield, throwing and catching punches, no rage, just form.  Intimate but apart - a form of service.  When we work gloves and shield I like to move in on my partner, give him or her an opportunity to hit harder and faster.   Sometimes I get backed against the ropes, and I feel like we're both getting somewhere.  It's focused and direct, straight-forward action, and maybe that's a reason it also seems devoid of violence.  I don't know, and more will be revealed.

And then, meditation class, and the end of suffering.  We worked in duos, dyads he called them.  The exercise was to ask, "Where are you feeling resistance in this moment?" and then trade off - two five-minute rounds.   Then the third and fourth rounds, "Where are you feeling release in this moment?"  The answers were about body parts, or emotions, or intellect.  Twenty minutes, in five minute trade offs.

At the end of it I felt totally released, with a wave of affection toward my partner.  I didn't expect either result.  I didn't expect anything.  We revealed very little to each other, but it was as intimate an exercise as I could imagine.  I asked, and she answered, and I had no opinions as to her answers.  She asked, I answered, and I had no opinions. 

No opinions, no attachment, no suffering.

Driving home I almost stopped to cry, but not sad, not happy, just human.

Just…human.

Human.

LOOKING FOR A LITTLE ACTION

There's no getting around the fact that I'm in my final third.  I'm sixty-seven, and have much, much less life in front of me than behind, so it's time to get a grip on the physical and mental health that will get me to a "good death," while keeping this life rich.

I've decided to give myself over to two disciplines for a year, keep track of what transpires, and hopefully lay the foundation for a continuing practice.

I've been a desk jockey, with a developing gut, and the denial that goes with it.  You know:  Oh, I'm not that much bigger.  If I just don't tuck in my shirt no one will ever notice.  Oh, c'mon, diets are for wimps.  I can eat whatever I want I just have to be a little more moderate.  What the heck, 33 to 35 waist is a natural progression for an older guy.  Until at some point a new reality:  Ai, yi, yi, I can't see my penis!

You know.

Over the years I've tried exercise programs that have either not asked that much of me - all level yoga that I kept to a pretty low level; or bored me to tears - just about anything at the gym.  One afternoon I was at a neighborhood cook-out, talking to a string bean of a gal - I mean 0% body fat - and she told me about a boxing workout she'd been enjoying.  It was music to my ears.  I've been a closet boxing fan since boyhood, (up to Ali, anyway,) but never thought there was an entrance for a civilian who had no interest in competing.  There it was, and so I called two gyms.  The first one, Cappy's, is a Central District institution, has good pricing (with a nice senior's discount) and perfect hours (I like to get this stuff out of the way as much before sunrise as possible,) but sounded way too popular, i.e. crowded.  The second was just opening, was woman owned and operated, and made all the same offers (well, the senior rate was a little less.)  But, I like (and trust) women, and that's what tipped me into Arcaro's Boxing Gym, and Coach Tricia Arcaro.

I also want to discover my mind.   I know the mind inhabits the three pounds of meat between my ears, and in all its unordered chaos contains the universe.   I'd like to explore that crazy immensity in some ordered way.  Insight meditation, grounded in Buddhism, but with as few smells and bells as any Buddhist branch I've discovered seemed to offer the tools, and a beginner's class led by Rodney Smith was just about to start.  My wife, Reggie, was also keen for it, so - perfect.  (Much keener for the meditation than what I hope will be the next step in the boxing workout - sparring.)

Serendipity has been the operating principal.  The whole bit about when the student is ready the teacher will appear.  It appears I'm finally ready, and as much as I've thought I might be ready, and explored forms and philosophies, I've been mostly in contemplation rather than action.

The teachers have appeared.

I'm looking for a little action.