Good Karma

I normally don't work Mondays but someone quit last week and I got called in. I like my Mondays so it was kind of a bummer, but good things happened! A woman who boards her horse at the barn owns the 24 hour vet clinics in Edmonton and said I could do my 80 hours of work at her clinics... hurray! Thats out of the way. She also told me the head of the Animal Health Program is a trainer who works with some of the boarders and their horses, so I hope that can work to my benefit as well. But now I'm tired and it's early to work tomorrow. Cheers!

It's the first day of kindergarten

I got promoted to Sihing a few weeks ago and I was really excited to go to the Sihing class on Friday nights.Everyone always said it was a really great class, and it is. I think the biggest thing it has done for me is make me realize how much I don't know. I feel like a white belt again. I'm clumsy, I have no flow, my body won't follow the instructions my brain is giving it. Despite those things it's exciting. I know I will get better and I like the idea of being able to wrap my brain around some of the concepts we learn and be able to translate them into my techniques, combinations etc. Cheers until next week.

It's official

I finally got my confirmation from NAIT last week, I'm officially headed back to school in September! I had decided not to say anything at work until I had my letter in hand. I've really been dreading quitting, since I am one of four employees. When I told my boss I said we had the whole summer to find a replacement for me, she said that no one could replace me. So that was pretty cool. What does this have to do with kung fu? Since I started UBBT 6 and continued on with 7, I have been consciously trying to do a better job on everything that I do, going out of my way to do things for others or to make sure that the job is done well, even though working in a barn doesn't require any special talents or skill. I have officially gone "out of the kwoon and into the world." I guess sometimes you don't realize that the baby steps you've taken have brought you so far. I like the fact that I will be remembered for my hard work.

Right Now

Last year at this time I was sick. My birthday and mothers day were days spent curled up in bed feeling terrible. It continued for months and I eventually got over whatever it was. I still don't know what it was, I remember all the different tests I had done and the time spent in the hospital and doctors offices. This weekend I was thinking of it and I started sweating, my heart raced and I got dizzy. I had a little anxiety attack just from the memory of how frustrating those months were.

So tonight while I did forms in the backyard I thought about how good it feels to be healthy and well. I felt my breath and my body work together and I felt happy to be where I am.

Tiger Challenge

Silent River's Tiger Challenge was on Saturday, and as always it was a great event. I only participated in one event this year since I'm letting myself heal up, but I got a chance to help out more with score keeping etc. Both of my daughters are in kung fu and they were really excited about the tournament. My youngest daughter is 7 and she's a little firecracker. We always talk to the kids about how winning isn't the point of competing etc etc, and they always nod their heads and agree and say "we know mommy". But Teagan really likes winning, so she just says these things to make me happy, since she hasn't ever lost anything. So this year Teagan is in a group that has a bit of a wider range of ages and maybe she didn't practice as much as she could have. She went through all four of her events and didn't place. She held up pretty well and had good sportsmanship, but when I asked her if she was ok there were some tears. Every kid gets a participation medal, but she felt the loss of those gold medals of previous years. By the end of the day she had totally forgotten about not winning her events and told us what a fun time she had. There were so many people that told her what a good job she did and were a positive influence on her. She got to run around and play with a group of kids from the club after the kids events were over. The great community and positive atmosphere of Silent River made that day awesome for her, once again I am grateful to be a part of a club that promotes such a healthy outlook for it's big and little members.

It's just a dummy, dummy

Today is my last day off and sometimes I almost don't enjoy the day off knowing that tomorrow it's back to the same old same old. But today Adrien and I went shopping for dummy materials. Adrien wanted to make a grappling dummy to practice techniques on. It was actually kind of fun and it took about an hour to make a somewhat lifelike practice dummy. As soon as the kids walked in the door from school they pounced on the thing.... I almost feel bad for this inanimate object. Half the time they want to pretend it's a prince or their future husband and the other half they're kicking him in the head and doing body slams on him. What a life. I feel a little sorry for myself too. I walked into the computer room to blog and my heart jumped into my throat because the stupid thing is sitting in the computer chair with it's bag glove hands on the keyboard "typing". Adrien just killed himself laughing and says he's been sitting there with butterflies in his stomach waiting for me to go in there and have a heart attack. He's having way too much fun with this thing! Cheers till next week.

Unexpected hiatus

So I am taking a break from sparring for awhile. I did something gnarly to my leg in San Shou and I guess I've finally realized I need to let myself recover. It's so easy to tell someone else that there is no shame in taking time to heal and not to worry about what other people think when you can't do everything that the class is doing or to train as hard as everyone else. It is so darn hard to take my own advice it's literally painful. I had high hopes to spar in the upcoming tournament. I love sparring, and I work hard at it but I just don't know if I'll be ok by then. I always have the idea that I'll go and just take it easy, but that never happens. I feel like a horse, chafing at the bit, I just want to go but I can't.