A New Path

[Not Tea Cassidy]

Raleigh, North Carolina.

 

The scene opens up downtown, where a view of the big city is shot. Amongst all the busy people walking the city, you’ll find almost anything you can think of in a city as big as this, with plenty of busy night markets and beautiful hanging lights greeting you out on the street to explore. Historic neighborhoods, southern diners, outdoor green spaces, performing arts venues, breweries, underground cocktail spots… all these things work together to create one incredible cultural hotspot.

 

Tucked away amongst the history and the busy streets is a small Okinawan-style dojo in the city. On the outside you’ll see a pair of Shisa, guardian lion dogs chiseled out of stone, which have been placed to maintain tradition. Upon entering you may feel slightly cramped from the small room you are greeted with, but it tries its best in maintaining a friendly and warming exterior. On the walls are neatly placed weapons kept in cupboards, which students are invited to carefully try out for themselves under guidance from Sensei.

 

On the wall facing towards you upon entering, you’ll find various posters and frames, detailing a chronological order of past Sensei in previous locations this dojo used to be in, with various examples of their way of teaching. Among these things are accolades this dojo has been awarded, but there aren’t that many scattered around. On the right hand side of the dojo, you’ll see a station for weight training for the students to use if they don’t want to use the mats placed in the rest of the room.

 

Despite having a good number of students turning up for weekly, sometimes daily training, the dojo has fallen on hard financial times ever since reforming five years ago for a variety of reasons relating to previous Sensei.

 

Various students are seen training Shotokan-ryu, a style which came from Okinawa and is the most popular karate style. On the left of the mats, a various group of students are practicing their hand-to-hand combat - using sharp hand and elbow strike maneuvers which Sensei occasionally checks to see how their form and confidence is.

 

In the middle and right of the mats, another group of students are seen practicing their kicking ability - using knees and their feet much the same way the hand to hand students are doing. Since Sensei is working on the hand-to-hand students this session, he has picked out a senior Karateka to assess the students’ form. Since this dojo has shifted its focus to training teenagers and young adults, the senior student picked is only nineteen, with scruffy long hair and a headband so none of that hair gets too close to his eyes.

 

This goes on for roughly two hours until Sensei calls everyone to the middle mats to close out the training session. The students bow before they leave, taking their shoes from the cupboard placed to the right of the main door and dispersing into the city. All but one scruffy haired, bandana wearing kid.

 

???: “Sensei, may I please have a few words with you in private?”

 

Sensei nods. He leads the kid into another room attached to the dojo which Sensei uses as both a private training facility and an office of sorts. The two sit down on a training bench inside the room, with Sensei allowing the kid to speak.

 

??? (Seemingly flustered): “Okay, Sensei. I just wanted to say… I love Wolf’s Creek, man. I thought as a young kid when I traveled into North Carolina with my family that it wouldn’t be… home for me, y’know? But I’m glad you took me in when I was only 14 and I found my place here in your dojo. That being said… I thought about our conversation last week about payment…. and I shouldn’t be here if I can’t pay. All I’m doing is taking away from this place. I’m not making it home for other people.”

 

Sensei takes a moment. He lets out a soft ‘Hm’ in response, before speaking in a calm yet assertive way.

 

Sensei: “You take nothing away from me, Tristen. What you give is you give back to the students who train among you. You passed down what I taught to the young boy who stepped foot in here as eager to learn as if I’m looking down at a mirror of my past. I know payment will arrive in time, you don’t ne-”

 

Tristen (Interrupting fiercely): “You don’t understand, Sensei, teaching those kids out there is not doing anything for the dojo financially. It’s not helping this place pick itself up after five years of struggle, it’s not taking away the stress in your life having to pay monthly for a small area that can barely even fit twenty people, it’s not helping me feel less guilty that I’m just leeching off of your hard work and making promises that I’m finding hard to keep. None of it is fair, me being here is not fair on you!”

 

Pause. Tristen thinks for a moment to approach what he’s trying to say, all the while Sensei is giving him a more stern look.

 

 

Tristen: “I signed a contract. It’s not a contract tying me down to a different dojo, no, it’s.. It’s a wrestling contract. I went to another zone, a combat zone. I had a tryout. I did some research into it, and I can use the skills you taught me in another form of combat. Maybe I could learn some new things, meet some new people… But I signed. It’s good for the dojo, me being able to find some money doing the thing I was born to do, y’know?”

 

Sensei: “Is this what you’ve come to tell me?”

 

Tristen nods.

 

Sensei: “I admire you taking initiative for yourself and for the dojo, but that does not excuse you interrupting me like you just did. You cannot be fully disciplined if you let immaturity take over, and this is not the first time we’ve had this conversation in this dojo. Don’t lose sight of that.”

 

Tristen looks down, nodding his head.

 

Sensei (a little more relaxed and understanding): “I’ll let this one slide, it’s clear your intent was in the right place… instead of the last times. If you want to step into other forms of combat, I can’t stop you. You’ve learned a lot under Wolf’s Creek and you’ll continue to learn some more, I’m sure.”

 

Tristen (Quietly, looking back up): “Thank you, Sensei.”

 

Tristen stands up from the training bench, with Sensei doing the same. Tristen bows to Sensei, with Sensei responding with a warm smile. Tristen and Sensei begin to walk off, but before they leaves the dojo, Sensei says one last thing to him.

 

Sensei: “Before you go back to that combat zone, ask yourself. Is this really where you want to take this path? Ask yourself before you go to bed, when you wake up, when you eat, when you train. If the answer is ‘no’ at any point, then you’ll come back full time.”

 

Tristen nods to Sensei, before taking his shoes and leaving the dojo.