So, what's new?

Well, I have another shiner, courtesy of a training session Tues eve. (See below for pics.) It started out as what grapplers and mixed martial artists call a "mouse:" a bump that, in my case, eventually flattens out and turns into a black eye. The guy I was rolling with didn't mean for it to happen. It comes with the territory. Plus, you can basically look at me funny and I'll get a black eye; I remember one time my training partner literally touched my cheekbone with his elbow--just a touch--and then poof.

Tomorrow is a tournament in Anaheim, sponsored by No Limits, the academy that sponsored our trip to Turkey. I'm going to go, maybe to compete (though I'm feeling REALLY beat lately), and definitely to cheer on some New Breeders and others. I heard from Karen Santaniello, whom you may remember as the wife part of the husband-wife team of Jim and Karen Santaniello. The women on the team that went to Turkey stayed at their home while we trained together for that previous week. She wants me to bring my USA team gear, the rash guard and shorts, etc. I guess she's setting up some kind of photo op for the team members who are going to be there. Darren and Tara will be there too. Hooray! It will be great to see them.

I'm working pretty hard at my online teaching gigs and getting up to speed on the consulting project I took on. I'm also back to a regular CrossFit and training schedule after the holidays, although I took today off. I didn't get as much sleep over Thanksgiving as I had hoped I would, and I also continued to CrossFit every day, so I guess I didn't give myself much of a break. Today Marcel (black belt instructor at New Breed Marcel, not cranky brown belt metrosexual Marcel) said he works out most every day, but he also sleeps all the time--he only wakes up to teach or to train. He could be exaggerating, but it was interesting to hear that he sleeps as much as he can, because I work out most every day, but I average about 5 hours of sleep a night, which I know is not enough for me.

Anyway, the real busy-ness will be through December 15, and then after that I'll get some breathing room. My courses end and grades are due on or around that date. My consulting deliverable is due in about the same time frame. There's a no-gi tournament tomorrow, one in Richmond, VA, that I'm flying out for on Dec 8, and the no-gi Mundial out here in Carson on the 15th. After that I'll get some time to relax. I just wish it didn't all culminate EXACTLY at the same time. Well, you do what you can.

So no wonder I'm tired. Dang. Of course that means that instead of going to sleep right now, I should post some pics:

Brooke, Una, and me at the Heartland Cafe, one of my favorite earthy-crunchy restaurants in Chicago. Also conveniently located relatively near Skokie, where Brooke and Una are neighbors. We had a GREAT visit!

A sign I saw for sale in a Christmas store in small-town Illinois. I immediately thought of Chrissy when I saw it. I forwarded the picture. She wrote, "It's funny because it's true." I started to disagree, but then I remembered that I didn't have permission to do that.

Eben pretending to give me another black eye. Eben is a black belt under Kamole, on Maui. He runs the New Breed in Portland, OR, and was in town to visit and to beat me up.

(BTW, we were both trying very hard not to laugh as this picture was being taken.)


Can't even be bothered to get off the phone.

Post-Thanksgiving contemplation

I’m back in LA. I arrived late last night after a fun week in downstate IL with my family. I always miss being on a college campus in the fall, and I miss it more being here in CA because the leaves don’t really turn, and it’s not cold enough to make mulled cider seem like the best idea under the sun, and football isn’t happening in my back yard like it did when I was living in New Hampshire and Michigan. So it was nice to be in IL, even though I am still completely hopeless when it comes to packing: for a one-week trip to a part of the country that averaged about 35 degrees by the end of my visit, I had about 15 t-shirts, 2 pairs of socks, and one sweater.

Perhaps that’s a symptom of my continuing fashion-challenged state. Since Marcel isn’t stepping up to turn me in to What Not to Wear, I may need to do it myself. I am realizing how little difference there is between what I wear when I go out in the world, what I sleep in, and what I work out in. For instance, on a Tuesday, I may wake up and put on a BJJ t-shirt and a pair of leggings and wear that all day till it’s time to train. I wear the same outfit to bed, and then when I wake up for CrossFit on Wednesday, I throw a sports bra on under the t-shirt and switch the leggings for a pair of compression shorts.

I have been thinking about this a lot lately. I think I want to feel more girly than I have been. I love training. I love the people I train with (mostly guys). But I want to start doing things again that make me feel pretty. (Believe me, I’m bracing for the onslaught of jokes from the peanut gallery, but that’s how I feel lately.) Being a chick in this environment is difficult sometimes. A telling incident that happened years ago, when I was a blue belt, has always stayed with me, and sometimes it bothers me more than other times. Right now it is bothering me.

I trained in Chicago with a very cool guy named Josh. He was a great training partner and a very interesting person--a tattoo artist and body piercer by profession. We were talking one day after class, and headed to the showers. I watched him keep talking over his shoulder to me as he turned right and disappeared into the men’s locker room (the women's locker room was to the left). I stood there for a second to see if he’d notice, but he didn’t come out.

The next time I saw him, he said, “Oh, that was so weird the other day when we were talking. I talked for another 30 seconds before I looked around and saw that you weren’t behind me. I kind of forgot that you wouldn’t be coming into the same locker room.” Translation: In my eyes, you are basically a dude.

Especially when I first started training, I did work very hard to efface my femininity. I joked around like one of the guys as opposed to flirting, I made sure I always wore a t-shirt or rash guard under my gi (some women wear just a sports bra—that’s not a judgment on women who wear just a sports bra, but that was never comfortable for me), I cried in private when things were frustrating. And I’m sure I gave off a “not available” vibe to the single guys.

I don’t know if I did it on purpose, but I do remember wanting to be taken seriously. And since it was basically me on the mat with dozens of guys, I guess I tried to be as like them as possible so they would forget that I was "other." So in Josh's defense, it makes sense that he would have treated me that way, because that's how I was indicating I wanted to be treated. It's not his fault that being treated that way bothered me sometimes. And if he had flirted with me or tried to protect me by not rolling as hard as he did (and he used to work me OVER), that wouldn't have been all right either.

In recent years I think I have learned better how to balance the girly and the tough. But that doesn’t mean the balance never needs adjusting. And especially since starting CrossFit and acquiring new muscles and a slightly different body shape because of it, I guess I’m feeling the lack of the girly. I can only imagine what the guys at the store or the academy would say if one day I showed up in a dress. I might have to try that just to see what would happen or whether they'd recognize me. But at the store I’d have to lug boxes or a stack of rash guards, and at the academy I’d just have to change into my gi or boardshorts. So, realistically maintaining the girly is an elusive goal sometimes.

Wow. I actually didn’t mean to write all about that. But I guess it was somewhere on my mind. Must be one of my priorities. Getting away for a week from what has become my routine gave me a little perspective on those. So, getting back in touch with my feminine side must be one (maybe I’ll spend one day next weekend shoe shopping and seeing a romantic comedy), which I’ve only realized during the process of writing this post.

Not surprisingly, another one is to continue to improve at BJJ. That has been a priority for the past year and a half, of course, but in the past couple months I have been training less than normal, and I want to shift the balance back. I know--I FEEL--that the main reason I’m in LA is to continue to benefit from the amazing instruction I’m getting at New Breed, not to mention the opportunities to compete, and I’m feeling all the more compelled to take advantage of that.

Another priority right now is to make some money. I have started a consulting project in addition to the two online courses I’m teaching. It’s a lot to take in at once because I’ve never done any of it before. So my learning curve is very steep. But it will all shake out. It’s just that it will all shake out around the same time—December 15. That’s when the consulting project is due, when the final grades for my courses are due, AND when the no-gi Mundial is happening out here in LA. And after that I collapse. Prettily.

I still want the other things I keep saying I want (relationship; place to live that makes me happy, whether it’s in LA or elsewhere; dog—have I said that one before?), and those are priorities too, but right now I don’t know what to do to work toward them. At the moment, the course of action for these others is easier to identify: train, work, get a haircut and a kicky skirt. So I'll go with the path of least resistance and trust that the rest will take care of itself.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Wishing all of you as much as you can eat. (And elastic waistbands.)

My week is going great. I had a fantastic time in Chicago, hanging out with Natasha, Andy, Gary, Sue, Brooke, Una, Eshanthika, Paul, Laura, and Todd. I so wish Chicago were the right place for me. I love so many people there, and it would make life easier. But it isn't.

Haven't trained since Saturday (when I pulled off a bow and arrow choke and held my own against all my old teammates), but I'm CrossFitting every day. Eating more carbs than I would like, but they are everywhere.

In less boring news, Andy has threatened to submit an application to The Amazing Race for me and Natasha to compete. We are both funny and we get along really well, so he thinks we could scat and riff our way around the world to victory. I'm all for it if he really wants to do it.

Anyway, all the best to you all and your families tomorrow and on into the holiday season!

En route

I'm traveling again. The diehard BJJers among you might be bored by this trip, because I'll only be training once. But give me a break; it's Thanksgiving. I will be sure to regale you with descriptions of the single and double legs, triangle drills, and sit-throughs I'll be doing to stay in grappling shape while I'm spending time with people I love for the holidays.

Sitting in LAX right now and headed to Chicago in a little while. I'm meeting up with Natasha and Andy for dinner, and then I'll train at Carlson, Jr.'s tomorrow. Unfortunately, Jr. is actually here in Southern California right now, so I'll miss him.

Anyway, I'm very tired. Sleep deprivation will do that to you. Got up early every morning this week, for CrossFit, for various trips to the airport. Hoping to sleep on the plane. If for some reason I can't fall asleep, I'm sure my program evaluation textbook will help with that.

Here's another clip about Fight Gone Bad. I'm in there as a talking head, saying some nonsense about contacting people. It's a wonder I'm allowed out in public. The person talking before me is Becca, one of my teachers. And there are various Petranek Fitness people in various stages of exhaustion while they do Fight Gone Bad.

http://www.petranekfitness.com/cms/index.php/workout/comments/we_did_it_together_were_making_a_difference/

Congratulations to Kahlil!

Roger Machado awarded him his brown belt earlier this week! Congrats, Kahlil!

Great visit with my parents, among other things!

I’m spreading grappling as if it were a gospel. Or a communicable disease.

Okay, not really. But my friend Jennifer (the one whose London wedding inspired such negative comments from Anonymous) sent me an announcement she received from an acquaintance about the Roger Gracie academy, which I visited when I was across the pond for the wedding. Here’s what it said:

“The Roger Gracie Academy is holding an open day between 1pm and 3pm on Saturday 17th November 2007 to encourage people to take up sport and exercise.Saturday's event gives anyone wanting to have a go at a new sport, the perfect opportunity to try their hand for free and, at the same time adopt a healthier lifestyle. Students are encouraged to bring a family member, friends, former students or children to the open day.It can be intimidating to take up a new exercise regime but joining a club can make this a lot easier. By supporting the growth of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, the Roger Gracie Academy is encouraging more and more people to adopt a healthier lifestyle. Regardless of whether you want to join a club or just find out how the Roger Gracie Academy can help you get fit, coming along to Saturday's event could be an important first step to changing your life. You'll be made to feel most welcome.The address for the open day is:

Roger Gracie Academy

237 Kensal Road,

Ladbroke Grove,

London W10

Tel: 0208 960 1112”

How British is, “You’ll be made to feel most welcome”? What about, “have a go”? "Ladbroke Grove"? Come on.

I think Jennifer may go check it out! I told her two things. First, that she needs to call Roger “Hodger,” because the “R” at the beginning of Portuguese names/words is pronounced as an “H”, and if she does it, she’ll have passed a very basic and important jiu jitsu snob test. Second, if she gets the chance to call Roger “Hodger,” I will be most envious, because he wasn’t there when I visited.

I am still enjoying the afterglow of my parents’ visit. We had a GREAT time. It was a terrific reminder of how much I like them. I love them, of course, but I’m really fortunate that I thoroughly enjoy their company too. I hope they feel the same about me, although even if they don’t, they paid for lots of dinners. So I’m good.

But in all seriousness, having them here made me realize how far from them and my sister’s family I am. And it’s weighing more and more heavily on me. I’m still not prepared to make any kind of move, apparently, but I have a feeling that will change sooner rather than later. It’s just hard for everyone to keep in touch over the phone because we’re all really busy. My parents and I joke sometimes about how retired life is busier than life with a job. I’m not retired, but I certainly act like it. And anyway, I like to be with the people I love, not just touch base with them once a week, or much less, in the case of my sister’s family—talk about busy! I doubt I’ll move to FL or to where my sister lives, but if I lived closer, I could visit more often.

We didn’t even do much. They came with me to New Breed to watch me train. They hung out while I graded papers. They busted my chops. They busted each other’s chops. They had their chops busted by me (wow, awkward sentence construction in the name of parallelism. Well, I am teaching a writing for research course.) It’s how we show love.

It was interesting to see my life through their eyes. I showed them my medals and some footage of me in the finals of the qualifier for the Turkey trip. I tried to explain a D’Arce/Danaher/brabo choke to them. I discussed the politics of grappling.

Here's me with some medals. (I guess I have competed a lot, but it's also pretty easy for chicks to get medals since there are relatively few of them at competitions. I hope that doesn't sound sexist; it's just a fact.)

It was funny to hear my mom calling my one training partner Big Ugly. It is his nickname (though as I pointed out, it’s not a good nickname for him b/c he’s not that big), but hearing it come out of her mouth was hilarious. And my dad wouldn’t let me pay for anything. I like having him around for other reasons, but that’s a pretty compelling one. My only regret is that I didn’t get to take them to Petranek Fitness. I think they would have gotten a kick out of that too—or worried while I did something crazy like 300 squats, though my dad is working out a lot lately too. He’s got some serious muscles.

Thanks, Mom and Dad! I love you.

I’m pretty sure having them here jumpstarted the magic in my life again too. I haven’t been feeling it lately, but when they were here, I started to feel it—and see evidence of it—again. Quick example: I contribute to my individual retirement account every year like clockwork; I max out the contributions I can make both b/c it will make my 65-year-old me happy and b/c I promised my parents I would. I had been worried that I hadn’t even started to contribute for 2007, but when I looked at the statement my parents brought me (a lot of my mail still comes to their house), it turns out I have contributed 3 quarters of what I owe myself for this year. I have no clue when I made these contributions this year, but apparently I did.

That’s what I mean by magic. There’s no way that could possibly have happened. But it did. The magic is coming back. Or maybe it was always there and I just wasn’t able to see it. That’s probably more the case.

I did the Helen at Petranek this morning (most of the workouts are named after women, kind of like hurricanes, is the rationale). 3 rounds of 400m run, 21 kettlebell swings with a 16kg kettlebell, 12 pullups. My time was somewhere around 13:47, which puts me on the leaderboard. That’s kind of cool. It was the first time I used the 16 kg kettlebell (usually use the 12 kg), so my form wasn’t great, but it will get better.

Here's my time on the Murph! Notice that Dawn and Becca kicked its ass. Notice also the times on the left: those are the guys' times.

Here's my Fight Gone Bad score from the fundraiser. I'm pretty stoked to be on the same board as Dawn, Becca, and Cill. They are strong, beautiful women and I'm becoming more and more like them! Hooray!

And while I'm posting pics, here's one I've been wanting to put up for a while. It's me and Darren right after the Turkey competition, sporting our medals and "representing" New Breed and Ouano International. I owe so much to Johnny and John, and I want to make sure I repeat over and over, ad nauseam, how grateful I am.

And here's another one of me and Darren, me pretending to be hip and him actually being hip as we give the V-Dub sign. Do you want to mess with us? I didn't think so.

And okay, while I'm at it, here are Ron and Danny hard at work on Halloween. (I wish they had bothered to find a costume.) You can see Balthazar the ball python in there too.

Now I'd better get to sleep. I trained pretty hard tonight (Marcel taught a couple of very cool spider guard sweeps) and am going to be up early for conditioning class again. And then it's more grading, and then hanging out with the above gladiators and snake.

My parents are coming!

Today! In about a half hour! Their flight is a little delayed, but I'm picking them up at LAX soon.

I'm excited to see them. I'm also nervous to have them get a load of my lifestyle. This is the first time they'll be visiting me since I left Chicago a year and a half ago. (It's also only been recently that I've actually had a stationary place for them to visit.) They would never pass judgment, but they would (and do) worry. Plus, I'm not at my happiest/most content with things lately, and that will make it difficult for me to give them the hard sell about how it was right to choose to live hand-to-mouth and train all the time when I could have a crapload of equity in a piece of primo real estate and a high-powered job. Well, for them, it truly is about what makes me happy. I just don't seem to know what that is these days. I do know it wasn't that. So that's something.

I'll subject them to as little of the watching-me-train-for-hours as I possibly can, though they want to see where I spend most of my time. I'll take them to the store, too, and then of course we'll eat, because that's what we do when we're together. Fortunately, they're not too militant or touristy; they just like to hang out and drink coffee and relax until it's time to eat again and, when 5pm rolls around, have another cocktail. Most of our visits as a family are "delicious."

Confidential to Steve72

Sigh. I guess I do.

(It was late when I posted that. Or early. "Thank you" for keeping me on my toes.

*Takes long swig of flip-flop.*)

Copping a squat

Right after I wrote that post, I saw this. Check me out: I totally squatted! And my squats SUUUUUUCKED before. Hooray for Petranek Fitness! (And for me, a little bit.)

http://www.petranekfitness.com/cms/index.php/workout/comments/gettin_down/

Ho hum

Steve72, I would consider BJJ Vision Quest 2007 only:

1. I truly am ready to be stationary for a while and
2. 2007 has less than 2 months left.

And Jimmy, I am working on finding ways to make money through BJJ. I've been somewhat successful, but not in a way that will support me in the manner to which I've become accustomed (which is to say, in a manner that affords me all the flip flops, beef jerky, and diet peach Snapple iced tea I can drink).

Not much going on. We worked on a takedown tonight called the leg whip, and we decided that the most important part of it is that when you remove your opponent's hand from your shoulder (s/he will probably be using it for balance because you will have his/her leg off the ground), you have to say, "Get off me!" or "No means no!" It certainly seemed important, if only because it had us cracking up. But I'm convinced that my technique was worse when I forgot to say it.

Johnny and I were rolling a little, and he complained that he had to pass my half guard by getting into my full guard and passing that. My full guard sucks. Not that Johnny can't do whatever he damn well pleases when rolling with me, but I can defend a little better from the half guard. It's kind of this weird clamp I have. I just need to learn what to do with it. And work on my full guard. I keep trying to recompose full guard on the bottom, but when I do, it gets passed pretty quickly. Dammit! Well, something to work on tomorrow.

So here's a cool thing...

My friend and CrossFit instructor Becca wrote an article about me that's appearing in this month's CrossFit journal. You gotta pay for the subscription, so I can't link to it, but the description is here:

http://www.crossfit.com/journal/

and here:

"Becca Borawski, 'Jiu-Jitsu Journey: How Valerie Worthington Found CrossFit and Won the Gold Medal' – Becca Borawski chronicles the journey of grappler Valerie Worthington as she traveled across the country in search of jiu-jitsu training, stumbled across CrossFit in Los Angeles, and went on to win gold in her weight class at the 2007 Grappling World Championships in Turkey."

It's issue #63.

So that's kind of cool. Becca is a great writer and made me sound really intelligent. I wish I looked a little more, um, girly, in the pics, but what can you do? There are going to be two other articles based on the interview we did; they will include pics of some grappling techniques I show on Andy that use CrossFit principles. Cool, eh?

In other news, I'm working hard at online teaching. I have a pretty steep learning curve, and the semesters are only 8 weeks long, so there's always something coming at me. Yet another situation in which to feel inadequate. I feel like I'm getting better at it slowly, but I also feel like I have been catapulted back to grad school, where there was always something more to read, or write, or think about, and definitely always something to feel inadequate about.

So it was kind of a quiet weekend. I read, graded papers, stressed out about reading and grading papers, etc. Oh, and I slept 11 hours on Friday night. Holy crap. I am also officially an old lady: at the coffee shop I took a couple extra Splendas just in case. I forgot that I did it until I found them just now in my computer bag. I took 3 extras. I don't know what situation would constitute "just in case," but I'll let you know if I find out.

Oh, and speaking of being an old lady, I am also getting old lady knees. The skin on my knees is starting to get looser, like an elephant's knees. I noticed it recently when I was stretching my hamstrings. It doesn't really bother me. It's just the kind of thing that fills my brain these days.

So that might give you a hint that I'm sort of slumpy right now. In addition to contemplating my knees, I have also felt like I'm in a holding pattern ever since I got back from Turkey. I am thousands of miles away from where I started my odyssey, I am a year and a half older (and maybe 3 or 4 days wiser), and I am now completely free of the debilitating allergies I am convinced were caused by my old job. I have met hundreds of new, amazingly generous and friendly people, gotten significantly better at BJJ, written hundreds of pages for posterity, and put thousands of miles on my car.

But at the same time, sometimes my current life feels very similar to the one I left behind: I'm working at a job I don't quite love, and I'm living in a place where I don't quite feel at home. And I'm not feeling any sort of direction that would give me a sense of what to do about either of those things.

Well, sometimes the best thing to do is nothing. And since my courses ain't gonna teach themselves, and my jiu jitsu ain't gonna improve itself, I'll focus on them. And my parents are coming to visit on Friday, so that will be a very pleasant diversion.

So the rest of it will have to take care of itself in due time. In the meanwhile, I will just take care of myself and my immediate responsibilities. And make sure I always have enough Splenda. And maybe investigate a knee tuck.