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Following on from last week, Mick has a lot of opinions. Have four of these done in a week. Longer than a chapter, shorter than a story, I’m calling them serialized vignettes for now. And making up the world-building on the fly, even as I maintain the Urban Fantasy story I’m about halfway through. Weird emotional mix, but apparently what writer-brain needed after finishing Kincaide. Little over ten thousand words across four of them.
And dojo last night was an interesting and novel experience.
I broke a rock.
In karate, some folks break boards to show off hands that should be registered as deadly weapons. Whatever. Sensei knows the technique for breaking rocks. In his case, either with the knife edge of the palm (outer edge by the pinkie) or the fist. He did both last night.
And he has had three of us training our hands by striking door frames and other things that don’t move. After a month, he sat us down with rocks and explained the technique. It isn’t a trick, but there is physics involved.
More importantly, it was about understanding that you could break rocks. Could hit something that hard and not hurt yourself, because most training in a dojo runs soft and careful, save for occasional moments where you warn your training partner ahead of time that you are going to step up EXACTLY ONCE then bring it back down. That lets both of you see what feels like.
So, I broke a rock. Kinda kewl. Will break other rocks at some point. Right now, the black belt test has started, and will run until December. A good teacher makes sure that the student learns it, learns it well, learns it right, and grows. Some teachers have to make things all about themselves, making the student look back during the test, and really making themselves look bad instead.
Here, I will be dialing things in and demonstrating proficiency, competence, confidence, and whatever knowledge. When he thinks I have it all, he’ll stand me up in front of the room and we’ll do the big test, but that’s an hour at most. Do the kata. Do the drills. Dance with a training partner.
Then I will have achieved a level that says I am ready to actually start learning. Because that’s all a black belt indicates.
Story: Emmett McCall is at 25k. Feels like 45k, in something of a weird 2-Act piece, but that’s fine. New everything here. Urban Fantasy with an Awakened Goat who is a Hegelian Trotskyite with an oversized keyboard, because on the internet, nobody knows you are a goat.
Mick, as noted, 10k. Have a couple of other stories out there in open states to go after as I finish things up, but I’m a full year and change ahead of myself writing, so I can dabble and wander from time to time.
And let writer-brain get a little hinky.
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seriously?
Stupid hummingbird hovering in front of me, about two meters away outside the window.
Normally, that’s complaints about the feeder, so I need to go check.
Pixie T-Rexs, man…
More soon.
shade and sweet water,
b
West of the Mountains, WA
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