Elfnoodles

It’s probably been about 15 years since I first heard of aikido and thought I might like to take a class sometime. I haven’t had a lot of opportunity; it doesn’t have a wide appeal and aikido dojos are few and far between. There’s one in northern Virginia, but from where we lived it would have taken hours to get there and back in the traffic. (I think I’ve noted before that the notion of the DC area having a lot of opportunities is a bit illusory, since it’s so difficult and time-consuming to get to them.)

Strangely enough, a week ago I had the idea of looking to see if there was a dojo in Blacksburg, and even more strangely, there is. I went to my first class this week.

Thud asked me if it was like the karate class he went to for a while when he was a teenager. “Well,” I said, “I don’t know, I don’t have anything to compare it to.”

“It was like band camp.”

“I don’t know. It was fairly structured, but I never went to band camp either.”

“The instructor was like a drill sergeant.”

“No.”

I went in really having no idea what to expect. I only knew aikido by reputation. I also thought it would be best to try to keep my cup empty, to not spend time thinking up expectations that would probably be wrong.

Aikido class turns out to be sort of like dance class, except that you or your partner always ends up on the floor. And there’s a lot of bowing. What I really admire about the way the classes are run is the emphasis on humility and cooperation. So no, it really doesn’t bear any resemblance to classes where the instructor barks orders at rows of students.

I ended up kind of sore – although I have had worse – and I seem to have strained one of my toes while trying to learn how to fall backwards. Other than that I am pretty keen to continue.