I began my walk today
working Yang Tai Chi Sword, or rather what I can do of it.
It was the most difficult thing I ever had to learn and attempt to do correctly.
I learnt ½ of it from
Ernest Rothrock when I studied Tai Chi with him. During the 2 years when I
learnt the Yang Form. For many years I did my best not to do it before him.
It was the simplest
sword I ever saw him do. I can recall training at his school, practicing at the
same time he worked on his daily practice. This was before he began focusing on
the Eagle Claw system, Each day he worked on different form sets. On sword day
I used to watch him work sword for an hour and it seemed to me that he was not
repeating a form.
Then one day, after
maybe 10 years, when I was visiting him in Pittsburgh. He decided that I had to
learn the rest of the tai chi sword form, so that was the challenge for the
weekend.
Many years later one
day when I was teaching a group that was studying tai chi with me, one of the
guy’s had a friend visiting from Maine with a tai chi background. He showed me
his Yang sword. I showed him mine. He was astonished that what I was doing was
vastly more complex that what he had studied.
So I struggled through ½
the form. And I remember, remember and dream.
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