Gradients

Onward.

Sometimes you just need to grit your teeth and take those steps that will lead you away from the scene of beauty and agony; those aspects that are constantly teetering precariously, vying for dominance over each other, over balance. How much easier it is to be able to assist something, or someone, by directly offering a hand; rather, knowing that the lack of your own presence will be of the most benefit -- stepping away, and relinquishing your hand, your voice, your want.

The last few days have been physically good. Two nights ago I went on a night hike into the mountains, which was excellent. We set a rockin pace, and even in the dark, we made the trip in about an hour and fifteen minutes, which is solid during the day, and got us back to the car just as the rain came pouring down.
Last night was kettlebell class, which was a grinder. A lot of suitcase deadlifts with two bells in one hand, two five-minute chunks of TGUs, and I'm fairly sure I did over 200 swings in the last 8 minutes alone during a partner trade-off. The suitcase deadlifts got me thinking about deadlifts, which I'm hoping to do tomorrow. I miss them.

Today was my first day trying out Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in Ventura. I'd done some 6 week seminar with some basic stuff about eight years ago, and other than that, I've never done anything martial arts related. I instantly liked the environment and the energy of the place and the people; it's really obvious that it's about the love of the art and sharing the knowledge and experience, rather than getting an ego-boner off of some superiorty trip that you see in some places where revered people teach. You don't get full-fledged respect without walking the walk, and there is definitely respect here. I got the strong impression that this place draws and keeps people that are centered and true. And I had SO MUCH FUN! My other forms of training absolutely came in handy. It's kind of fun to find out that you can heft some guy over 200 lbs. around and illicit a wide-eyed response. I really enjoyed the balance of aspects... and I can't wait to learn so much more. I can see a new obsession being born.

Sidequest of the day: I realized I left home for class without wearing underwear. Who does that? Me. Anyway, I thought: hmm... rolling around on the ground without that = a bad idea. I had colorful possibilities going through my head of what could happen at my first day of class. Since I didn't have time to drive back home and get to Ventura on time, I drove to the nearest place to buy some. Consumerism is a whore, by the way. It's impossible to just buy a pair of panties. Buying three pairs if cheaper than buying one, and if you buy a fourth, you get four more pairs free. Then, geez... you're just wasting money if you don't buy four more. You have to pick the color and the size and the pattern... @#$%! So now I have eight pairs of panties instead of one. And at the register, you're offered several super-duper-special-offers-that-are-unparalleled-in-their-SUPERDUPERNESS! But I just want some panties for Jiu-Jitsu! Two registers malfunction! The panties need to be re-scanned and re-wrapped! No, no, leave the wrapping! No, it's the policy! Thus I concluded, I should have just gone commando, and clothes shouldn't exist anyway.


I know -- seriously crazy.