Paul’s Aikido Origin

Greetings, to whomever decides to read this brief and honest tale dealing in the origins of my membership at East Lake Aikido.

It is an understatement to say that putting this together has been a struggle for me, and for others who would like to see what I have to say as well. You know who you are, and I thank you for your interest, which has unfortunately and necessarily been wrapped up in some level of frustration due to my struggle in composing it. 

Most of us have an easier time running a spirited marathon for the hills than exposing our soft underbellies for just one moment, which is what an origin story would be for me. When a human being does not wish to do something it can be remarkable to see the myriad colorful excuses which come out of them, like a kaleidoscope, and on several occasions I have found myself looking down the tube at all of those symmetrical snowflake crystals within myself! I could go into the seemingly valid excuses for not wishing to write this, but ultimately they do not matter, because like so many little plastic colorful crystals aligning at the end of the scope, we all come together to form a beautiful shape.

My main concern is that I do not want to affect others, especially such as yourself, with the black ooze of my story. I don’t want to expose dark themes in all of this, or rattle anyone else’s commitment. But then, that is an excuse and I dont own those things. This is a safe space, and adults want to know, and oftentimes painful experiences reveal the greatest lessons. Will profound lessons be revealed here, from my origin story? Certainly not. But if something does emerge from behind dark clouds in reading this, please do share that with me, good or bad. So here goes, and be advised that this short tale will include unpopular bits and pieces of things that could be considered triggers for some folk. I did not want to write this but I feel a duty to.

I guess one could summarize my interest in Aikido as being based in an interest in (“need” of) survival from a very young age, due primarily to the fact that I was physically abused heavily in my childhood by my brother, who was 4 years older than me. Around the age of 6 or 7 or so I became interested in defending myself with open hands, like in the movies, and was committed in that aim, without any support or training options for a couple of years. When it became obvious that untrained open handed techniques were largely useless against an insurmountably stronger adversary, and retreat had become impossible in many cases, weaponry of all sorts caught my attention. I needed a means of defending myself against an incredibly violent, angry, and unhinged brother. Before assumptions come to mind about “brothers rough-housing” and “normal young boy behavior” and a boy’s seemingly mystical attraction to combat and weapons, let me start to unscrew the lid containing some of the dark ooze I mentioned earlier. I was unfortunately or fortunately raised in a negligent house hold, which wasn’t a house hold at all, but rather a house where people lived, where anything went, and any trace or evidence or testimony about wrong doing was laughed off or (more often) ignored. “He tripped and fell on his face” was the cause of that bloody nose. 

This environment was a tiny power vacuum in the world, which ultimately will not amount to much difference in the human fabric, but it made a huge difference to me. These types of environments teach through pain and lead/inform the future by means of avoiding the perpetuation of that which hurt you. It is pretty incredible to consider how many people have risen out of tiny power vacuums like the one I was raised in to create a far more balanced landscape for themselves and others, it is a feat in and of itself to reach normalcy. Yet others succumb or even worsen the conditions they found themselves in, and my brother is a good example of the latter. My ardent wish is to be able to say one day that I embodied the former.

It is both a good/bad thing that I escaped and endeavored to be different, because the experience was a great teacher/crutch. If you have come farther than others had to, there are more miles of rough pitted road behind you, but you are sitting next to your peers in more or less the same place, regardless. They don’t understand the incredible hardship of your journey and the courage it took to just get by, and you don’t understand how everyone takes it for granted. And so there is a strange and alien looking kind of contradiction encapsulated in that journey. It got you there, but also you feel you got there. Thats good/bad. And here I am typing about this and making it sound like a big deal when our black brothers and sisters are risking their lives in the streets so that their lives don’t constantly need to be at risk in the streets. Taking rubber bullets to the skull and being tear gassed and beaten with batons. What a mind trip, and how petty of me. This is a pathetic thing at an inappropriate time, but everyone on earth has a story. Mine cannot compare to theirs.

In this tiny and deeply private power vacuum, way out in the middle of nowhere, in woodsey, rural, hick, violent, meth-wracked Wisconsin, where you must be gay and subject to punishment if you don’t drive a huge pickup truck with a dead deer in the back, or a gunrack at the very least, there were three things that saved me. Two are absolutely wonderful, the third, less so:

1) The gorgeous rolling hills and the pockets of pine trees on the hillsides which cast down their needles to create a perfectly flat, warm, shaded, maternal ground to lay upon in hiding and meditation. Meditation and projection into a different life, a different place, often even a different time. A place with culture, Europe somewhere. Anywhere Europe, with its romantic spires, ancient bridges for foot traffic over channels, and rich, decadent art. A time with purpose, a valiant mission, grace under fire. If only I could show my courage there? Where would I have ended up in World War Two. Or, on the bad days, oblivion. Furious protest/ cancellation. Followed by soothing nothingness. Does one have the power to push themselves over that last bit of edge? Truly? Does it just need to get a little bit worse, and a little bit worse, and a little bit worse, and then I will do it and finally cross over? Or can it be infinitely a little bit worse?

2) The constant unjudging love given to me by dogs…. of all things, who’s outdoor kennels I slept in often, emerging cramped and covered in hay ,drool, and fur the next morning. But emerging safe, loved. By an animal. Who knew deeply how to parent a human better than the humans did.

3) The violent, but benevolent affirming power of firearms in the hands of someone who has had enough. There is that edge again, but this time the problem could be solved outside, not within. And it almost was.

My father, who I have to this day never had a conversation with, was an angry savant gunsmith and engineer, undiagnosed but almost certainly carrying some asperger’s. He was successful, but shared nothing with anyone. Not a wisp of any emotion other than anger, not a speck of himself, not a word of wisdom, not a penny outside of stark utility. Not a single family meal. Not a single hug. Separate rooms, always. The absent signs of hope in a child’s world which are like steps on a staircase, replaced by steaming anger boiling just below the surface and ready to erupt for anything. Begging for an excuse to erupt. Dying to erupt. My mother, who to this day is the only person I’ve ever seen engage in real conversation with my father, albeit one-way, has never been able to stand up for any one or any thing, least of all herself. She is the only person I know who I have never seen take a stand for anything. My brother and I bear the distinction of knowing the single exact reason why we exist on this planet; we were the one requirement for my dad to keep my mom. So it gives me a flicker of satisfaction to know that perhaps one day before we existed she took a stand. At least it certainly looks like it. How else?

He never wanted us, and she was never qualified to have us. We are here because we raised ourselves, deeply dysfunctionally, but alive nonetheless. The pine trees and the Alaskan Malamutes raised me. The result could have been far more disastrous than it ended up, but we will see how things progress. Things are now elderly, 40, and 36.  And not together, but separately.  I havent seen or spoken to my brother in 13 years, in fact most of our family hasn’t, because he has been in federal prisons across the country. It’s a miracle he is alive. With regards to childish, boyish rough-housing: he started landing in juvenile detention, jail and prison with alarming regularity beginning at the age of 17, due to violent acts perpetrated upon helpless girlfriends. Before he was 17 and landing in trouble this way his violent outlet was me. I was a pacifist, I was soft. I tried every day against all odds to stay that way in a hostile environment. It was only after I finally took a stand at the age of 13 with the help of a rifle that I knew like the back of my hand that his sights were set elsewhere. I will never forget the look of terror in his eyes. Because he knew I might actually do it, he knew he had driven me THAT far.

Along the way, no one believed the stories. They were too disturbing, he would never do that. No one would. In fact, what was wrong with me? I must be the disturbed one for “having invented them.” An angry, unhinged, unregulated brother, who exhibited extremely concerning behavior as early as his toddler years had an ideal target in me. I was kind, sensitive, quiet. When he was forced to realize that the next time would result in his death, he left me alone, and I will always own a firearm because of that, though I hate firearms. But I have always had a tinge of regret for the girls he shifted his attention to. I know what they went through and I don’t like to think about it to this day. They were young, innocent, often he was their first boyfriend. I tried warning two of them when it was early, I kept tabs from afar. They never believed me. Ultimately it was always the girlfriends’ dad who would take matters into their own hands, after blood was shed, incredible threats were screamed in anger, and property was destroyed or burnt. Have you ever seen an enraged, powerful man on top of a car punching through it’s windshield, which is webbed, shattered,caving in blow after blow, and full of a million piercing shards? And then to see him use his bare hands to peel sections away, destroying himself in a rage, so as to get at it’s occupants who had locked themselves in there for fear of their lives?  Can you imagine all of the blood? Now imagine her father had called 911 ten minutes earlier, and the sirens blaring in the distance, and not seeing any hesitation on his deranged face? Then imagine him somehow overpowering three or four bulky cops, knowing at any moment they would shoot him right in front of all of us? How is he still alive? Things like this happened over and over.

Imagine seeing him on top of his girlfriend who was 8 months pregnant, beating her mercilessly on the couch, her blood everywhere, screaming, and pulling him off of her without hesitation, at risk of my life, in instinct. And then barely making it out of the house, knowing he would give chase, so as to get him away from her? And then speeds of over 100 miles per hour in the car, being chased. To this day I believe I saved the life of his first son while he was not yet born. He is 13 now, his name is Tanner. We met once when he was in a stroller at the Mall of America, his dad was in prison.