Things I Love About Jodo Practice

• when I'm doing Kasumi no kamae, the way I can feel the heat radiating off of my steaming forehead
• the way Furukawa Sensei (at age 75 or something) is the only person that I can't basically fling across the dojo at will with a strong Tai-atari
• that feeling of excitement and fear I get when he looks like he's going to practice with me
• how when I practice with him, I feel a weird combination of terror ("Don't hurt me!") and total calmness and trust ("I know you're not going to hurt me ... but you could ... but you won't... whoops, that was close ...")
• that look he gets on his face when he knows he killed me, and I know he killed me
• how he puts me through my paces while keeping an eye on the rest of the class; he doesn't even need to devote his full attention to me
• the almost musical "Spak!" sound of a good hikiotoshi-uchi
• how Mr. Watano and Mr. Kadomatsu, two of the nicest, meekest guys you'd ever care to meet, turn into demons of screaming woody vengeance when they practice together
• the fact that, in this day and age of high-technology, oak and rawhide are still the best things to make practice weapons out of
• "Ieeeiiii!" and "Ooohhhh!"
• how, after practice, all the problems in my life seem less important. I'm up to my eyeballs in debt, but who cares? I don't have a girlfriend ... so what? It'll work itself out somehow.

How about you?