Do No Harm

Last night I made the mistake of watching a couple of news magazine segments on children and guns.  It’s not the kind of thing I watch at home, since I spend all day at work keeping an ear on the news that blares from the dozens of different televisions on the floor.  I’m also the kind of woos who doesn’t want to see a dead child on any of her screens when the program is fiction.  So to listen to real life parents talk about making a mistake so big it cost them the life of their youngest child was seriously disturbing.

I don’t own a gun and never have; so it’s not like one of my children or their friends is going to kill themselves or someone else in my house with my weapon.  But I have made several choices – thankfully, long in the past – that endangered a loved one or two.  The program awakened me to those memories and to the greatest nightmare I can imagine: being personally responsible for harm to one of my children.  I can do without those thoughts.  I can also do without ridiculous theories related to guns that raise my blood pressure.

I once read a blog post by someone who was trying to make an argument for guns having a place in martial arts training.  I don’t remember exactly what my comment was, but it was along the lines of: “Are you out of your mind?”  The first thing that came to mind when reading it was having some of my six, seven, eight year old students in the guan at the same time as someone “training” with a gun.  What??  The image was like something out of upside down world.  I don’t have any problem with anyone’s Second Amendment rights, but in martial arts, the weapon is supposed to be your own body, primarily.  The addition of a staff, sword, spear, etc. is just gravy.  The idea of adding a gun strikes me as complete insanity…but maybe that’s just me.

Okay.  That’s enough of that diatribe.  Off now to welcome a new black sash into the ranks after a couple of current black sashes (one of which will be my son) makes him prove his sparring worth.  I love these days.  There’s something truly special about welcoming a new person into the ranks.  This will only be my third time doing so as a black sash myself, but it’s like bringing a new child into the family – one you certainly wouldn’t want to see get hurt.