I have this same problem every time I walk into some sort of physical training or sports-oriented group and tell them I'm interested in signing up. Maybe it's the limp that shows off the two-inch difference in length between my legs, or the brace I wear to support my right ankle that does a good imitation of Robocop when I'm in motion. Or maybe it's the cane I lean on when it's been a bad day and I'm more tired than usual. Who can say?
"Are you sure you want to try this?" they ask, looking at me with a mixture of surprise and fear of liability suits.
I'm a polio survivor. I was one of those hundreds of thousands of people caught in the epidemics that swept this country in the early 1950's, before Dr. Salk perfected his multiple-hypodermic vaccine and before the Sabin vaccine with the sugar cubes. In fact, I was in the field tests of Dr. Salk's vaccine. They figured if I already had contracted polio, there wasn't much chance of me getting it again and maybe the vaccine would do some good. Even if there was no benefit, I could tell them if the vaccine was safe to use on other people. It may have been a bit of a cold-blooded approach, but I was too young to argue at the time. If you asked me today, I'd tell them to go ahead and give it a shot, no pun intended. I know what polio did to a lot of people and I wouldn't wish that on anyone if there were a way to avoid it. A lot of kids I met in the hospital never made it home. Sometimes they haunt me and remind me to try harder.
I grew up watching the other kids play sports. It's tough to run with a heavy metal brace on your leg, and the chance of injury or damage to an expensive piece of equipment made my parents leery of giving me free rein of activity. Hey, I was still a kid, with a lot of chances to get in trouble. So I spent my formative years watching the antics of doctors, nurses, interns, hospital aides, therapists and an occasional psychiatrist, who wanted to know if I felt any anger for people who could do what I couldn't do. Of course I was angry. But I learned that everybody has limits. I just needed to learn to work with what I had and do as much as I could. It was those ghosts haunting me, telling me to keep going.
I tried martial arts when I was in grade school. At the time, my body was still growing and having the usual problems with changes in balance, muscle control and coordination. When you also consider the atrophied muscles left over from polio and the special shoes I had to wear on a daily basis, trying to work out barefoot was a whole new experience, with painful results. Learning martial arts wasn't working for me. Like any other kid, I got into my share of confrontations. Add to that the normal adolescent habit of picking on the strange and the weak in any group and I was a perfect target. I wanted a way to keep my skin in one piece, but so far, martial arts wasn't doing the job. I learned to avoid fights as much as possible, which may have been better for me anyway.
Fast-forward a few years in time. I grew up. My body settled down into something I could learn to live with that wasn't changing every day. I began to learn to work with what I had. I began to take part in sports. I'll never be much of a basketball player, I found out. There is just too much running back and forth. I'm a fair hand at volleyball since I can judge the trajectory of the ball and move far enough to get there, most of the time. But some part of me still wanted to study combat styles. After all, I was still a target, and these days it pays to be prepared.
Having grown up on stories of King Arthur, swashbuckler movies with Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power and the ever-popular Zorro serials, I was drawn to the sword. I found a local school that taught fencing and paid it a visit. After a long talk with the head instructor and a couple of lessons, I was hooked. Fencing is a sport that demands as much from you mentally as physically. My instructor told me I'd never be Olympic material, but there was no reason I couldn't do well at tournaments with some practice. I started, as most students do, with the study of the foil. This is a very light weapon, weighing about two pounds, with no edge and a covered point. The target area is limited to the upper body, minus the head and arms. You stand with your side toward your opponent, arm out and holding your foil, and try to keep your opponent from hitting you while trying to hit him or her with the point of your weapon (okay, it's a lot more involved than that, but let's keep it simple for now).
Since I had limitations to my movements, being shy a leg that worked, I concentrated on my hand movements and reflexes. I didn't use the fancy moves that called for running or jumping at your opponents, like the ballestra or the fleche. My instructor told me I'd have to fence like an old man. After he laughed, and ducked, he explained that younger fencers enjoy the fancy movements that make fencing look so flashy. They tend to use their physical skills at their foremost tactic. But older fencers, and smart fencers, use their ability to draw an opponent close, rather than try to run after them. I must use feigns and planned attacks to draw an opponent in range. Once the attacker was close enough, a parry/lunge combination, done quickly, would finish the match. It wasn't flashy, but it won me a lot of points in tournaments.
Studying fencing was fun. I learned all three competition weapons: foil, epee and saber. Each has its own target areas and rules for scoring a point. My personal favorite soon became the epee. The epee is the sport weapon most like real combat. The point alone is used, but the target area is the entire body. In addition, in both foil and saber, you must begin an attack and carry it through in order to score a point. This is called establishing right-of-way. If your opponent attacks you, his attack must be deflected before you can riposte and score on your own. In epee, it is possible for both fencers to score at the same time, a double-touch. With the entire body as a target and no need to establish right-of-way, you could wait for your opponent to move, then strike into his attack. If you touched first, the point was yours. Since most people give up some level of defense when they focus on their attacks, this was an effective tactic to use. All it required was speed and a good eye (and sometimes a lot of luck, but that's another story).
After about six or seven years of fencing, I moved to another city and was looking for something else to keep me in shape. Once more, martial arts beckoned. Looking into several dojos, I found one with an instructor willing to work within the boundaries of my physical limitations, in a style that didn't require running laps and jumping over obstacles. I learned the basic moves: punches and kicks, blocks and stances. Each lesson in the early days was as much trying to find something that worked for me as it was learning the style of the school. But I learned and progressed. My right leg can't kick worth spit, but my left, overdeveloped from years of compensating, is pretty deadly. My punches and blocks are as good as any other student in the school.
Years of learning how to deal with my own limitations gave me an unusual perspective on trying to find your own abilities. This insight comes in handy with some of the new students. And when a parent comes in with a special child, sensei points to me and says, "If he can do it, so can your child. We'll find a way."
I've made it to brown belt so far. Not as fast as some other students, perhaps, but I'm satisfied with the progress. I'll probably never take any trophies or win any sparring bouts at a tournament, but a while back sensei came up to me after sparring in the dojo and stated he wouldn't mind having me defend his back in a fight. High praise from a fifth dan. I know I'm not the best student around, but I do work hard. One day I may even make black belt. Then I can truly start learning the martial arts.
Until then, I'll just work with what I've got and ignore the handicap.
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