Why Fencing?

Greetings dear reader:

This is a blog about fencing.  Particularly my own experiences with fencing.  Ever since I was a young boy I have been fascinated with swords.  My earliest recollection of a sword and swordplay was from the Disney animated movie Sleeping Beauty where the Prince slew a dragon using his sword.  I don't remember much else from that movie.  I certainly didn't care much for the rest of the story, me being a boy and thinking that girls were icky at the time.  That part where he kisses the princess and they live happily ever after, went right by me without notice.  My only thoughts were of swords and killing dragons.  Later on in my childhood I made wooden swords and played with them.  I made armor out of cardboard too.  Let me warn you that cardboard doesn't absorb kinetic energy very well but if you paint it it can look pretty impressive.

My first real experience with a sword was when I was fifteen.  I was walking past a house in my neighborhood and in the yard I saw a man giving a fencing lesson to a student.  I forget what weapon it was.  But I stood enraptured, watching the event and after what seemed like forever the man called me over.  He introduced himself and ased if I wanted to take fencing lessons from him.  I enthusiastically said "YES!" and so he became my first fencing teacher.  My life would never be the same.

A week later I was standing before him with a saber in my hand and a mask on my face.  The mask was a bit uncomfortable at first, but I quickly got used to it.  In retrospect, I realize that I should have learned the foil first.  My teacher Will, did in fact try to give me a foil lesson, but due to a medical condition he was unable to hold a foil and direct its point.  So saber would be my weapon of choice for a while.

My lessons lasted until the end of the summer whereupon he moved and left no forwarding number.  You see, Will was a tragic figure he was just recently out of a divorce and his body wracked with complications that diabetes had inflicted upon him.  So when he vacated that house, keeping in touch with some fifteen year old kid was probably the last thing on his mind.  I never forgot him though and years later I re-connected with him.  There would be more lessons of course from him and other teachers of the sword.  Some great and some not so great.  But since my first lesson with Will, I knew that I wanted more than anything else in the world to master the sword.