Watching the sword fights

It's funny to watch Robbie in his sword class. He just loves to swing that weapon! And I'm glad Jacob is doing it, too. They've been best friends since kindergarten (maybe the first day of kindergarten!) so it's extra incentive to go to class to be with each other.

Here they are practicing their strikes and blocks.





They really love it when they get to practice strikes on the dummy.

I don't know if you can see the fierce look on Robbie's face.


Both boys had a bit of trouble with etiquette Thursday night. If Robbie learns anything at the dojang, I hope he learns how to submit to instruction with grace and good manners. Both Robbie and Jacob are smart boys, and they tend to be critical about being told what to do. This gets them in trouble. Eli's much the same.

In fact, in the car, Robbie told me that he didn't like school because "the teachers control you too much."

I thought about it and later said to him, "you can get along best in school if you just find out what the teacher wants you do to--and just do it. Then you won't use your energy fighting against the teacher, and you won't feel like you're being controlled. And you can go a lot further and get a lot better, too."

With Robbie, I'm never sure if those kinds of comments get through. I think he just gets turned on by the excitement of resisting someone. Still, if he would just align himself with the intentions of the teacher--align himself with "the force," to use Star Wars terms--he'd be able to go much further, in Kum Do and elsewhere.

We all would.