“Of course you can’t beat me. I’ve been fencing half my life,” my son consoled me, after another of our lopsided bouts. “The question is, can you beat you? At the end of your lesson, can you thrash the fencer you were when you began?”
How did I find myself cast in this generationally reversed version of The Karate Kid, receiving age-young wisdom from a 14-year-old sabre-slashing sensei?
Call it a Coronavirus Caper.
At the onset of lockdown, Alistair struggled with the social isolation of distance learning and even more, with the sudden halt to fencing club training and competitions.
How can a mum perk up a kid facing a grim line-up of remote study modules? On a hunch, I invited him to teach me his sport.
Before I had time to rethink and recant, he eagerly marked out a piste on our car park, and presented himself, masked and armed.
What had I agreed to?!
“I’m a runner, not a fencer,” I warned him. “A flight-over-fight kind of girl. Don’t expect too much.”
When your expectations are low, you get what you expect.
He charged. I froze.
He smashed my helmet with his sword. I screamed.
A whack to my arm had me checking my padded jacket, certain it was drenched in blood.
My coach wielded his criticism as incisively as his weapon.
“Blade work, mum! Like I showed you.”
“Aim for my body. Not my sword, my body!”
“Defending doesn’t get you points. Attack! Attack!!”
By Week Two, I was thoroughly piste-off (and well ready to get off the piste).
One more fight, and I’d tell him I quit.
The resolution must have boosted my adrenaline because —
“Touché!” exclaimed Alistair. “It’s your point! See what happens when you attack!?”
“That was a one-off,” I thought. “I’m not naturally aggressive!”
That’s when I realised that quitting was not an option.
After all, how many times had I cheered and challenged my son to overcome his own natural set points?
Whether it was a water slide or a scholarship exam, I insisted that to claim new vistas, you must conquer yourself, and that as you stretch, life’s possibilities extend.
Yet the whole time, I’d been preaching discomfort from a cozy pulpit. The predictable routines and demands of my professional life are all carefully tailored to my tastes and talents. My tasks, however numerous and complex, are generally variations on familiar themes.
Let’s face it. If everything you do feels natural, you’ve carved out a highly artificial — and claustrophobic — mini-verse, shutting out most of what the cosmos has to offer.
So, I refitted my helmet, took up my sword and . . .
. . . lost, 15-3.
Which was a whole lot better than my usual 15-zip.
Because every point was a victory of will and maternal commitment over instinct.
And the next evening, I did it again.
As lockdown eased and Alistair’s club re-opened, I willingly ceded my position on the piste to other, worthier adversaries.
My fencing bruises are now healing but my lessons from lockdown have left their mark.
I have made sparks fly from clashing blades, gleaming orange in the setting sun.
I have witnessed my son at his most vigorous and able, as an athlete — and at his kindest and most resourceful, as a coach.
And I’m pretty sure that Jo-at-the-end-of-lockdown could thrash pre-lockdown-Jo’s butt — both on the piste, and off.
*****
An extended version of this article appeared in The Sword Magazine (Jan, 2021 edition, p. 29).
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