9/1 Tuishou
Late again to CKS Hall for the morning session. Everyone was either engaged in tuishou or conversation, so I went over by the closed-up coffee shop to practice the form. It felt good today, and I needed the benefit as I’ve been feeling a bit low-energy lately. My hands felt…not heavy, but more substantial, full of Qi coming and going. Every move felt like falling into a shallow well, just natural, even inevitable. Of course I was still doing many things wrong, as Teacher Xu did not hesitate to point out after a while.
I brought out the sword and went through that form a couple of times. Better than usual, but still not good. The weight and heft of the new blade still throw me from time to time. I still believe that once I get used to it it will be of great benefit. At the very least it will build up my wrists.
I did some pushhands with a newer student surnamed Zhang. He’s really young, younger even than Teacher Xu’s son, and hasn’t even done his military service yet. He’s as tall as I am, and has at least the equal to my reach. I only got into trouble once, when he was bending my wrist in such a way that I might have injured myself if I hadn’t disengaged. He was so concentrated on pushing me that he left himself open to even the slightest push, but evading his efforts was a decent workout and stretched me up to and beyond my limited range of motion. I need to work on that.
A thunderstorm was rolling in as Teacher Xu and the other students left at around 1pm. I went through the sword form again, alone on the opera hall balcony, and then left for my weekly feast at Sababa. A good practice.
I’d forgotten just when I began studying with Teacher Xu, so I went back to my archives to find out. I did a search and found that I started in fall of 2002. Five years ago. My, how time flies.
