tai chi dedications

As mentioned, we have a performance coming up at the Ethnic Festival. Sit's been rehearsing us like we've never seen before. We even did a dress rehearsal today--uniforms and everything. People are more serious when they're in uniform.

A couple of my classmates surprised me. There's a very quiet guy, been coming to Wednesday class for a couple of years, bravely soldiering on in the face of having no clue what he was supposed to do, and all of us giving him conflicting orders. He's obviously been practicing, though. Today I watched him do the first kung fu form quite cleanly and precisely--predictable flaws, of course, but better than some who've been doing it longer. Then he stepped up with me, the SP, the master and the master's wife, and did the second tai chi/"kicks" form, which he'd had to learn by himself, in Sit's basement. I hadn't even realized he knew all of it, and we hadn't reviewed it in some time, but he went through the whole thing confidently. I'd had some idea that he was quick to remember sequences, but I had to shake the guy's hand after class. He makes me a little nervous, to tell the truth. I may have to start practicing, myself.

One very funny thing that happened, after we did our demos: Sit fired up some new music, took up his performance sword and sashayed out onto the practice floor as if he had only just happened to have a sword and thought he may as well do the sword form for our demo. Remember I said he tends to decide what he will perform at the last moment? But clearly he had been planning this for a while, because this was a song we had never heard before, and he had all the timing cues down. And as he passed by us on his way to the "stage," he gave me a big, toothy grin to make sure I was paying attention.

The SP saw it. "This one's for you, babe," he said to me under his breath, with a wink and a leer.

I was choking back laughter so hard I barely saw the performance. I know, you had to be there--you have to know Sit, and the whole weird familial dynamics of the class--but trust me, it was funny.