En Garde!

I'm off for summer, and I'm not really planning on working, so I took up fencing to pass the time. I first became acquainted with the sport in the summer between junior high and high school. The city offered classes as part of their recreational program, and I thought it sounded interesting. Now, to be honest, I expected the dramatic swordplay found in movies and television, not the measured and technical sport of modern fencing. Still, the reality was very interesting in a different sort of way, and I took a shine to it. A few sessions later and many of my friends had joined in too.

I kept up with it through most of high school. There was even an article about us in the school paper, the only time I think I was even so much as mentioned in it. At the risk of being immodest, I think I achieved a respectable level of skill given my length of experience, though I remained perhaps too lazy to really push my gains. Later on, I gave it up all together. This was due to a combination of things, but mainly it was exhaustion and familial frustration. To start with, I had martial arts classes on Monday and Wednesday, fencingon Tuesday and Thursday. As time wore on, I just started to get sick of both because I was just too tired. More importantly though, I dropped fencing, and pretty much every other activity I had, out of spite. I won't go into the intricacies of Yin family politics. Suffice it to say that I became fed up with parental guidance and decided I just didn't feel like doing anything.

Will Brown, the instructor who runs the program, was gracious enough to extend an open ended invitation to come back and give it another try, and I've decided to do just that. This summer I have no other pressing responsibilities, so fencing is not only an excellent source of much needed biweekly exercise, but my interest in the sport has never really gone away. This is an opportunity to start over, learn it all from the beginning again, and see if I can't do even better.

For more information on our fencing organization, visit the Fremont Fencers website.