Trick of Light

by Hunt-David

  Everything feels "right" this afternoon. I have found my center. I own the place where I stand, and a good-sized area around me. Rita has counseled me many times: "When you step onto the mat, take possession, make it your own."

  It is time now for the randori. For the first time in all my years of aikido training, I don't tense in anticipation of a multiple attack. A good ten aikidoists contend to go at me. The first four in line ready themselves while the others fade back to their positions in the rows. I give a quick glance at my attackers. Two men, two women. All four are familiar. We have all trained together during the retreat.

  I stand ready to take them on, claiming my space, drilling my legs down into the mat, preparing to blend. And then, Justas they come at me, I enter a trance state. Even the bright sunlight that floods the field house doesn't distract or blind me now.

  I don’t think about anything, don't calculate, don't prepare, simply take them on as they come, turning, blending, wheeling as I throw them off. I float. Every move I make seems faultless. I turn... and turn... and can do no wrong. No gesture is wasted. I seem to have achieved the miraculous state of mindless perfection which Rita calls "pure flow."

  Nothing can touch me unless I let it. No one can hurt me, not these attackers, nor anyone else. I am not there when they think they have reached me. They collide with one another as I step between them or move back. There is no resistance from them because I have defeated all resistance within. Everything is clear. Even the light seems to change, to modulate to a darker tonality more gentle on my eyes. Targets become larger, easier to see and find, the light becomes sharper and, paradoxically, more mellow. The squeak of bare feet on the mat. The sounds of heavy breathing. I don't face my opponents, I face only myself as I sweep them all aside.

  I am the center of a whirlpool of energy, aware of everything around me yet fazed by nothing. Time is warped. Actions that appear to others as sudden are for me orderly and slow. Shadows are elongated, becoming deeper, textured like black velvet. Grunts, groans, cries and pants turn into music. And I am at the center of it all, she-who-harmonizes, she-who-is-the-music, blending effortlessly, cleanly, in tune with the cosmic process, every breath clearly drawn, every move structured as in a dance.

  * * * * *

  The exam is over. I'm seized by an enormous sense of clarification. I pause, search the faces turned toward me, read admiration in hundreds of pairs of eyes.

  I think: I did it, and now I have regained my life. My time of mourning and anger is over. Once again my life belongs wholly to me.