Stick with What You Know

 Last year, Shark Girl marveled at how BJJ kept off her “winter coating.” This coating is more accurately called blubber, and it surrounds Shark Girl’s abdomen after the feeding frenzy of winter’s doldrums. This year, Shark Girl’s body has adjusted to jiu jitsu, and the blubber has returned. There it is right now, hanging over my pants.

Last week Shark Girl wondered to herself, “Is that a soft ripple in my shirt, or is it the overflow of my gut?” Then, very scientifically, Shark Girl pressed her finger to her shirt. It was gut.         

It is in this atmosphere, Gentle Reader, that I bring you the following story. I warn you that it is a rather sad testimony to the depths of my terrible eating habits and I hope that you will not think less of Shark Girl for it. Here goes:

           

In my disguise as Shark Teacher, I was conferencing with a student. It was during lunch so Shark Teacher apologized that I had to eat while working with her.

            “I hope you don’t mind . . . I’m eating salad. I’m trying to be good,” Shark Teacher confessed. (Student’s class is after lunch so she gets to hear all about my dietary transgressions.) Then we continued discussing really intellectual things.

            Suddenly, uh-oh! Some balsamic vinegar escaped down the wrong part of my throat and made a break for my lungs! Shark Teacher started coughing violently.

            “Ack! Ack!” I sputtered, interrupting Student in mid-discussion. “Please continue,” I croaked out.

            Student went on, but in all the excitement, a tiny piece of lettuce had made its way down my trach. In a fit of hacking, I excused myself for a drink of water and apologized to Student.

            “That’s what I get for trying to be healthy,” I opined.

            “Stick with what you know,” Student said. “Brownies and cake.”

I have heard some say that a white belt is about surviving and a blue belt is about figuring out your “game,” what works for you. As a newly-minted blue belt, then, my job is to find out what works for me and stick with it, improving and sharpening those skills that that suit me best. That student basically articulated my Big Blue Belt Goal. Nutritionally, however, I think I have to broaden my horizons. Especially if I want to melt off this undulating blubber. Can I start after I finish eating my sons’ birthday cake?

Dear Shark Girl . . .

Shark Girl has been overseas (See new profile pic. It’s me at Vatican City! No, I didn’t armbar the Pope, but it crossed my mind!).

Upon my return, I found the following message in my in-box. I am posting it in case my answer can help others in the same predicament. If you have any suggestions for “Got the Blues,” please share them, too!

Dear Shark Girl,

Recently I got my blue belt. It’s a great color and I’m really excited to show it off. There’s just one problem. It is so stiff that it doesn’t keep its knot. I tie it, but even just drilling seems to unravel it. I spend more time retying the damn thing than actually practicing jiu jitsu. My classmates are starting to notice and to make fun of me. I am proud of my accomplishment, but seriously, this is enough to make me run back to the comfort of my white belt.

                                                                                    Got the Blues

Dear Got the Blues,

            I can relate. My new blue belt does the same thing! Here are some tips to help you feel comfortable in your new blue belt.

1)      Suck it up, pansy. Seriously, you are a blue belt in jiu jitsu and you are complaining about a stiff belt? Come on. You are supposed to be able to kill people with your legs.

2)      Wash it. That mojo thing is a myth. Not washing your belt surrounds your waist with a breeding colony of bacteria just waiting to infest any small scrape you may have. Plus, the agitation of the washing machine will surely make your belt cuddly soft in no time.

3)      Sweat on it. You heard me. Are you allergic to sweat? Get on the mat and bust out some perspiration. Instead of worrying about how your belt looks, concentrate on your game. Not only will your jiu jitsu improve, but the sweat seepage into your belt is sure to soften even the most untamable of belts.

4)      Forget about it. Moving up to a new color belt can riddle the most self-confident person with fear and self doubt. Do I belong with the blue belts? Now I can’t tap to a white belt! Oh, crap, how could I forget the headlock escape . . . again?! Perhaps you are projecting a more deep-seated uncertainty of being a blue belt onto the actual belt itself. That is unfair to your belt. Forget about your belt color and just walk onto the mat. In time, as you feel more comfortable being a blue belt, your belt will feel more comfortable, too.

Well, Got the Blues, that’s all I have to say, except that you might want to seek out some professional help, maybe even couples counseling for you and your belt. And as far as your classmates making fun of you, find something about them to ridicule. I’m sure one of them has funky toes or a unibrow.

Shh . . . It's a Secret!

Training Breakthrough

I have always admired the way a good practitioner can get on the mat and, sans partner, mime the motions to a move. Air-grab–air-grab–hip-escape–bump–turn. That’s how you do it. “How do they do that?” I would think. “I can barely get it right with a compliant partner, let alone the thin air.”

Well, last night, there I was, trying to explain a move to a partner. Words failed. It was easier to show it. And—ta-da!—I mimed the move. Applause, everyone, and no, bouquets are not overkill. After sixteen months, I have actually internalized some moves so completely that it is easier for me to mime them than to try to explain them.

If you are throwing flowers, I prefer a nosegay like this one. It's simple, yet chic, and "nosegay" is such a cool word.

It reminds me of my journey studying Latin. I spent three years doing hard grammar and reading mechanical prose. I could tell you all about the “ablative of degree of difference” and then turn around and parse the hell out of that verb.

Then they threw poetry at me. I learned to just read, because rules in poetry are meant to be broken. So, I forgot about the rules and just read Latin. Conversations with classmates would sound like this, “How do you know to translate that like ‘he plunged his sword in all the way to the hilt’?” And I would reply, “I don’t know. That’s just what it says.”

            Then one day I walked into a prose composition class. All those rules? Guess what? They were important to know again. Although I could read Latin very well, I realized I had internalized the rules and could not explain many of them anymore.

I am happy that I have committed some jiu jitsu to muscle memory. It is the first step toward seeing the underpinnings of the art and building an organic and dynamic game. I also see that the next step is to to do both—to feel the move without thinking, and then to be able to express the move to someone else. But sheesh! I’m just happy with this for now!

Shark Girl Gets Her Poetry On

Last week a cousin e-mailed Shark Girl. He got his DNA tested and wanted to share what he learned with all his matrilinear relatives. Among the various tidbits about haplogroups and other things I can’t pronounce, Cousin added,

            “Apparently, we're also distantly related to Petrarch.”

            For those of you who don’t know who Petrarch was, first, join the club, and second, you can Wikipedia him. I must warn you that Cousin felt Petrarch was “Chinese food famous.” This means that about an hour after he Wikipediaed Petrarch, he forgot what the big deal about him was.

            I (kind of) know who Petrarch was because he wrote a lot in Latin. I just returned from a conference of classical professionals where a scholar presented a paper on Petrarch. I probably wouldn’t have gone to the paper, but I felt obligated, being related to him and all.

           

Since I now have famous poet blood in me, and since Husband started complaining that Shark Girl is “formulaic,” I thought I’d branch out and give you some submission grappling poetry. I know . . . just what you’ve been waiting for. And for all you Latin geeks out there, this poem is inspired by Book II of Vergil’s Aeneid. (I haven’t titled it yet and am open to suggestions.)

***

But look! Across the field of blue

Immense legs make their way forward

Writhing and snapping like snakes

After a careless foot has disturbed their resting place.

Without seeing they sense my presence

And stretch to reach me.

Biting, they embrace my back

And coil around my slippery neck,

Squeezing out my air.

The hiss of blood blocked from its path

Fills my ears.

I wonder,

What madness drove me to the mat?

And tap.

© 2012 by Shark Girl (because you know you want to steal it)

I Beat Up Boys

This afternoon Shark Girl got on top of Husband. If you want to be technical, I was in mount.

“Try to get up,” I said. “It’s been a long time since we’ve wrestled.”

When I started BJJ, Husband wrestled with me periodically to check my progress. This resulted in a series of professed back injuries and whining, until Shark Girl couldn’t take it any more and just stopped the progress checks altogether.

“I know I can’t get up,” Husband said. “I’ve given up. It’s official: you can beat me up.”

I do have a long history of beating up boys. It all started in the third grade . . .

Psychedelic Time Travel Picture (and optical illusion)

***

When Shark Girl was in third grade, Mother of Shark Girl came home from the parent-teacher conference with some news for Dad.

            “She scratched a boy,” Mom told him, chuckling.

            She was laughing because here was this cute little, tiny girl, (Little Shark Girl was about the size of a kindergartener) beating up on boys. It was the family joke for some time. (Even today if you were to bring up this incident around the Extended Shark-Family dinner table, Brothers and Sisters would ROTF and L. Or L their FAO. Or maybe they would just LOL. I know they would do some acronym.)

Nowadays, a student scratching would be a huge deal, written up by school administrators. The perp would be forced into counseling, or Child Services would be brought in. Back then, Mother of Shark Girl only asked, “Why?”

            “On the playground, Paul B— gave my friend Danielle half a chi-chi,” I explained. (A chi-chi is our familial term for the double butt squeeze often given to cute children’s bottoms.) But I wasn’t telling everything. When the lights were off in my and my sister’s room that night I whispered to her that the half chi-chi was not on Danielle’s backside, but actually Paul had grabbed her crotch. Little Shark Girl was defending Danielle’s honor.

Danielle moved to our school in third grade. I’ll never forget the first time she came into class. She was tall and pretty and blonde. When she walked into the room, everyone’s head turned her way. I felt a pang of jealousy. Why couldn’t I be blonde? Danielle wasn’t perfect. She licked her lips in our blustery winters, causing chapping that extended up to the base of her nose. It didn’t matter, though, she was blonde, and Little Shark Girl learned the hard lesson that tall and blond trumps cute, dark and short any day.

Up until Danielle came along, Paul had a crush on me. It was on that very same playground in second grade that Paul danced around me singing, “If I can’t have you, I don’t want nobody baby!” Little Shark Girl rolled her eyes and told him to get away. Maybe I scratched him then, too. If I didn’t, I should have.

Check out the song, plus the groovy 70s vibe!

***

I’ve come to terms with Paul and what happened in elementary school—both the sexual harassment and even being “dumped” for a blonde. (Believe me, I hadn’t seen the last of either experience.) So tonight when I heard “If I Can’t Have You” emanating from the Oldies station, my hand dropped from the buttons and I started singing along. Husband is not an Oldies fan, so to placate him Shark Girl said, “This song brings back memories,” and I told him the story about Paul B—.

“Humph,” Husband replied.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Well, I was just thinking. . . . If you had married Paul B—.”

“What?”

“Well, if you had married Paul B—, not much would be different. You’d still be beating up on him!”

Thanks, Husband, for your vote of confidence.

Shark Girl Dreams Big

The other night I had a dream. A jiu jitsu dream.

Shark Girl's styling dream accommodations.

It was dark, and I was at home. In my dream, my house looked like a row house, connected to its neightbors. The front door opened up to a riverfront. At night, the riverfront was lit up and folks hung out on their stoops. It was a new house for me. As I looked out the window, I saw a tough-looking young woman accompanied by some thugs. They were swinging neighborhood cats around by their tails and when there was enough speed and the cats’ bodies looked like helicoptor blades, they tossed them into the river.

Outrage filled me. Overcome by loathing and the memory of my dear, departed cat, I burst out the front door and leaped down the steps toward this hooligan and her partners in animal cruelty.

I have to set the tone now, or I’ll be beset by this bully for as long as I live here, I thought. Not to mention she’s killing cats. What kind of a person kills cats?

As I neared, I did my best puffer fish, blowing up my tiny 4’11” stature by putting my hands on my hips, sticking my chest out and raising my neck. I can’t remember what happened next, but her posse deserted and I ended up giving her the rear naked choke.

I remember thinking, If I let her go, she’ll overpower me. But if I keep choking her, she’ll die. Curses! I’ve never practiced the sweet spot between consciousness and death before. This is a limitation of my training. And what if she fake passes out and jumps me when I let her go? Do I have to kill her?

Well, I won the day (I don’t know how), but I was too late to save all but one of the neighborhood cats, whose plump body I embraced and brought home to live with me in the sanctuary of my new, riverfront row house.

About now you’re asking, “Nyquil induced dream, Shark Girl? Or did your basement wine turn bad? Did someone slip an acid tab in your Greek yogurt?” Personally, I think it was one too many episodes of Breaking Bad. You know: generally good person gets caught up in the Underworld for, what seems to them, good reasons, but then is forced to do heinous and more heinous things. I try to decompress with 30 Rock afterward, but you see what that added to my dream. Cats and obsessive thinking. Yes, my dream was a hallucinatory cocktail of critically-acclaimed network darlings.

 

I recently read an article about the advancements of brain technology. Scientists are getting closer and closer to being able to project the thoughts and images we see in our brains. I would be able to just download my dream into a video clip and share it with you here instead of trying to remember the murky details of my valiant feline rescue attempt. Of course, the down side of this technology is that people’s thoughts would be vulnerable for harvest. It makes Facebook and Google look like your most loyal confidants.

Would I give up my mental privacy to be able to replay my dream match? It was the best (and most meaningful) match I’ve ever had (sort of). But I don’t know. I think it would compromise Shark Girl’s anonymity.