I have decided that I need to become a cartoonist. Too many uptight people get offended at cartoonists. I tend to offend certain people. At least if I were a cartoonist I'd have an excuse... Plus other people would get a kick out of it.
- If you were offended by my last comment then... (finish this thought yourself). -
So, my side... I get up in the morning in mild pain - after a shower and pain reliever I feel normal. I go about the day and in the afternoon it starts hurting mildly. By evening the pain really sucks... So I think I really do need to be a little more careful with myself. I might head to the doctors if it doesn't start getting better soon.
Speaking of being more careful with myself... I went with Nat to Houston Parkour today. I took it carefully with myself because of my side. Soooo... First impressions (keeping in mind that these may all be completely wrong - I'll update and write what is really up after I've been around them a little while longer)... I enjoyed the people. Everyone was nice. The warm up was ok. It was fun to start off with, but was missing a structure and wasn't quite thorough. But it's possible that they work certain areas in rotation... The problem was that the lack of a structured leadership meant that once it petered down, it stayed low energy with little going on (the 3 minutes of rain we got may have contributed to this, but it was mostly caused by the lack of structure). Things got going again a little bit with some creative focused movement, but the farther into the jam we got, the more and more people ended up standing around. The youtube videos probably aren't a great example of everything that they have going on, but it seems that there is a focus on practice of single specific movements, creative movement, and gymnastics, but they forget to put them to use in certain ways that are needful for a well rounded parkour practice. I see a lot of people performing one movement, perhaps followed by a second, but I am very surprised to see that a group that seems to have members with at least some level of competency in it, has videos of gym stunts and single movement mastery - but not a single video with a longer flow, hooking movements together. Likewise, I was once again surprised to discover that the jam didn't have a single flow that was presented in it - nor were there others off practicing alone creating their own flows. And I, for one, believe that is one of the most essential elements of a good parkour practice. The creation of a flow trains you to adapt each movement in a new way. It is by making fast transition flows that you learn grace and ease of movement, while being able to generate power with little or no preparation (ie: you don't get to run up to it, you only get a single set for example). Most importantly, that type of a series of movements allows you to really learn how to control that power. It is the combination of those things that allows a tracuer to move through obstacles with "flow" or grace and ease. Similarly, long flows, and other training methods all have elements that are essential to training for PK. Practicing - even mastering - each "move" does not a traceur make. I left feeling as if I had not yet done Parkour. I had exercised and prepared myself. I had fun with the creative movement section (I would do similar things if I were getting ready to choreograph a site specific work). I had even practiced some moves. But I had not strung them together in either a run or a flow. I had not had the opportunity to experience hooking one movement into the next, into the next... I had not gotten up from a roll with my eyes focused on my next target, my legs already sprinting before I'm completely upright, my body adjusting as I gauge the distance, to complete the next movement, etc... I felt as if I had done all the movement and physical things which surround and relate to the art of Parkour - without ever actually doing Parkour.
As for the group... I don't know them very well yet of course, but I have been around such groups enough that I'm pretty sure my impression of them is fairly accurate. There is the core group. They have some experience and skill, but are still green. They know that they have something, and they know that the something is going somewhere. They even know that they are supposed to figure out where it is going and how to get it there. But they haven't quite figured out what that something is yet, where it is going, or - since they don't know those things - how they are supposed to get it there. This makes me a little anxious actually... The reason is simple, I've been doing Parkour for almost half of my life. I'm not necessarily great. There are things I'm learning new all the time. But I have a good deal of experience, and I'm really not that bad at PK. It is a part of who I am. What that means is that I have a very good idea of what parkour is to me, and what it means in my life. Where I want to go with it. What I want to do with it. I see this group and I think I have a lot to offer. They have skill. They just need direction. The reason that makes me nervous is that they have a group that has been built around certain things. They may not have a perfect vision of where they are going - but they have some ideas. They have mentors. They have favorite YouTube videos. They have a general direction that they have been going in all along. They even have followers. Such groups are always going somewhere... And they have been going somewhere since they first started meeting and saying: "Hey, lets try this." They just don't have a clear enough vision of where they are going yet. Like driving with a foggy windshield. You get the general idea, but the details come later. So if I jump in and say: "Hey, this is what these guys did, and this is what I did, and this is the history, and if you did this you would probably do really well with this..." etc. Then, if I'm pointing them in the wrong direction for their group, then I can cause them a lot of frustration. For example... I am very much into Parkour philosophy. It governs a lot of my person PK practice. I saw a couple of guys who came later who seemed to be a little more into showboating... So, if this group is headed in a freerunning/showboating/etc direction, and I come and try to point them in a direction based on my philosophy, then it just won't work. And I think they are great, if my ideas and philosophy are different from theirs then I will find others with my attitude, and this group can go and do what they want. I see no reasons to rock this boat... Of course, if they do harmonize with how I feel about PK, then I really might have a few things to offer (or I could just have an inflated ego).
But then again, there is a pretty good possibility that I'm wrong and they know exactly what they are doing and where they are going and I just caught them on a down day (I'm not wrong. It's possible. But I'm not).
All in all: It's a really good group with some great people. They lack structure, and certain things in their practice (from what I have seen so far) that really need to be incorporated - but as they figure out what they have and where they are going, those problems will fix themselves. I left disappointed because I really hadn't done much PK - even though I had done everything else but parkour, but I'm going back and have a feeling that this group will be worth it to stick around with a while and see what happens. If I can contribute to the group then AWESOME. If not then I'll continue to do my own parkour practice and will find those with whome I can contribute.
Move,
Sean
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