09-02-2013, 10:16 PM
Posting here as it is the closest to a "Doom Jobs" thread as we have.
Among other major life changes in August, i am no longer a Halberstadt Fencers Club coach. I've taught fencing there since 1986. I was an unrated competitor when i arrived, worked my way up to an "A" rating there, competing on the national circuit until 1992. i came there because it was the toughest fencing club on the west coast and because the new head coach, Peter Burchard, offered me a job as assistant coach.
I trained 6 days/week there, competed on Sundays in foil, epee, or occasionally sabre. Worked my way up to "local tough-guy" status, won one national medal (team foil bronze). i was head coach there for 4 years and my teams earned two natonal bronzes and lots of regional gold + silver. i learned so much about people, politics, and pettiness during those years. My life's goal since post high school had been to become a fencing master, to teach fencing for a living, and to be head coach of a major competitive fencing club. Halberstadt is where that all happened.
i also learned that you sometimes have to let go of your hard-won accomplishments. I learned that there are no-win situations. I learned that life goes on even after you achieve your dream. For me, "life" *is* fencing, in its glory and its small-mindedness, in the beauty of pushing to your physical limits, in the fear and the rush of putting it all out there on the strip fighting strangers one-on-one for no other reason than beating them. No money, no endorsements, all your time and money, all of your sweat, injuries, pain... the glorious pointlessness of trying to be the best at something that society knows nothing about. Working to achieve mastery and finding out that mastery is always over the next mountain, not the one you just climbed.
Halberstadt is where that happened. It was a forge, it was a pressure-cooker, it was a refuge, it was where the only other people who truly understood me were. It was where i was made, where i made myself. 27 years.
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Starting this week, I'll be Head Coach at the West Berkeley Fencing Club. It is only 3 nights/week in the club (my main coaching for the past 7 years has been with an intense elite junior program called the M-Team) but it is a big break with my past. i'm looking forward to the new club and creating new programs, but will still miss the old salle and the memories.
Among other major life changes in August, i am no longer a Halberstadt Fencers Club coach. I've taught fencing there since 1986. I was an unrated competitor when i arrived, worked my way up to an "A" rating there, competing on the national circuit until 1992. i came there because it was the toughest fencing club on the west coast and because the new head coach, Peter Burchard, offered me a job as assistant coach.
I trained 6 days/week there, competed on Sundays in foil, epee, or occasionally sabre. Worked my way up to "local tough-guy" status, won one national medal (team foil bronze). i was head coach there for 4 years and my teams earned two natonal bronzes and lots of regional gold + silver. i learned so much about people, politics, and pettiness during those years. My life's goal since post high school had been to become a fencing master, to teach fencing for a living, and to be head coach of a major competitive fencing club. Halberstadt is where that all happened.
i also learned that you sometimes have to let go of your hard-won accomplishments. I learned that there are no-win situations. I learned that life goes on even after you achieve your dream. For me, "life" *is* fencing, in its glory and its small-mindedness, in the beauty of pushing to your physical limits, in the fear and the rush of putting it all out there on the strip fighting strangers one-on-one for no other reason than beating them. No money, no endorsements, all your time and money, all of your sweat, injuries, pain... the glorious pointlessness of trying to be the best at something that society knows nothing about. Working to achieve mastery and finding out that mastery is always over the next mountain, not the one you just climbed.
Halberstadt is where that happened. It was a forge, it was a pressure-cooker, it was a refuge, it was where the only other people who truly understood me were. It was where i was made, where i made myself. 27 years.
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Starting this week, I'll be Head Coach at the West Berkeley Fencing Club. It is only 3 nights/week in the club (my main coaching for the past 7 years has been with an intense elite junior program called the M-Team) but it is a big break with my past. i'm looking forward to the new club and creating new programs, but will still miss the old salle and the memories.
In the Tudor Period, Fencing Masters were classified in the Vagrancy Laws along with Actors, Gypsys, Vagabonds, Sturdy Rogues, and the owners of performing bears.