Fencing Bear at Prayer

I was getting into the car in the parking lot the other day, and as I was opening the door, it swung out and (gently) bumped the car parked next to me. As it turned out, there was a couple sitting in the next-door car, and when the woman in the passenger seat felt my door hit theirs, she turned on me a face of pure hatred and rage. Who did I think I was paying so little care for her property?, her face screamed. She rolled down the window and I asked if she wanted to check for scratches (none), at which point she shook her head and dismissed me with disgust. The incident passed, but as I got into my car and drove away, I was still writhing with indignation at the implication in her face. Her anger only fueled mine as I started to tell myself stories about how "women like that" always treat me. Imagine if I had played the moment somewhat differently. I might have been more careful about the car door, but the cars were really so close together, it was almost impossible to...

Fencing changes your brain. Okay, I don't have neurological proof for this (yet), but I do know that since I have been fencing, it is difficult not to see my everyday interactions off the strip in terms of fencing. I would be tempted to call these "lessons for daily life" if that did not seem to imply that one could somehow take these observations and "apply" them without having to fence. I see what I see because I am fencing. Friends who do not fence are often mystified by what I am talking about. For example, fencers talk about "keeping distance". Now, I am by no means sure that even yet I know what this means, at least in the sense of being able to do it, but one of the things that I think it means is the sensation one has of pushing or being pushed. One fencer is moving in a way that forces the other to respond. Visually, at least to those who do not know how to keep distance, this can simply look like one fencer moving forward while the ...