The Kata Do Not Care That You Were Sick

The last fitness post ended with a line I wrote to myself as much as anyone else. The sword does not care what you weighed yesterday. It only cares whether you showed up today.

We did not show up for two weeks.

The whole family went down. Not one at a time, which would have been manageable. All three of us, together, for two full weeks. No dojo. No gym. No Monday session with Tommy. The hakama sat folded in the corner and the iaito stayed on the rack. When you are sick you rest. That part was fine. What I watched for was what came after the rest.

This is where habits have died before.

The Pattern I Know Too Well

Miss a week and the calendar still has the appointments on it. Miss two weeks and the brain starts negotiating. You need another day. The rust is too thick. You will feel embarrassed going back behind where you were. The gap becomes a reason to stay out instead of a reason to get back in.

I have been here before. With every fitness attempt before the one that got me to 289. With skills I let atrophy. With habits that had a two-week hole and never recovered.

This time we came back.

Last week Tommy was back on the schedule and the dojo was back on Tuesday. That is the answer to the negotiation. Not motivation. Not a plan. Just showing up on the day it was supposed to happen and doing the thing.

This week Tommy had somewhere to be so Monday moved to the home gym, running his programming on my own. Side planks with hip dips are in the rotation. I understand exactly why they are there. I do not have to enjoy them to do them. That is the point.

Three Months at Kashimon Dojo

In December 2025 I walked into Florida Budokan’s Kashimon Dojo in Eustis and started Toyama Ryu Iai-Battodo alone. By the second session my daughter was with me. By the third, I had convinced Noelia to join. That third session is where the family became the family.

That is how the dojo refers to us now. Not by our names when one of us is missing, but by the missing piece. Where is the dad. Where is the mom. Where is the kid. That kind of belonging takes longer than three months in most places. It did not take long here.

The Kashimon Dojo is the first dojo in the Americas to be recognized as an official branch of the Toyama Ryu Iaido Battodo Renmei. The lineage runs from Nakayama Hakudo through Nakamura Taisaburo, Ueki Seiji, and Mukai Masaharu to Kashimon Dojo. When Sensei Velilla corrects my grip, that correction traces back through an unbroken chain to the art’s founders. That is not a small thing to think about on a Tuesday night in central Florida.

Three months in, here is where we actually are.

Batto 1 and 2 are solid for me. Toyama 1 and 2 are solid for me as well, and those are the forms I am now teaching the family. Noelia and our daughter are building those together. Toyama 3 and 4 are where I am currently in the curriculum. They are not yet in the family rotation. I learn it, I own it, then I bring them up behind me.

Sensei has tasked me with running nightly home sessions using video references from one of the Dan-level senpai at the dojo. That changes what the role requires. I am not just a student in my own house. I am the instructor. My understanding of each kata has to be clean enough to teach it before my daughter or Noelia ever picks it up wrong, because there is no fixing a habit that got built incorrectly from the start.

We have also been building a written training guide to support all three of us, documenting the confirmed lineage-specific principles: no saya push, heels-together military posture, kesagiri as the second cut rather than shomen, Seigan kamae post-cut, two kiai per kata. Not suggestions. The form.

Beyond the Mat

Being part of a dojo like this is not just about showing up to train. Arching Oaks is a 501(c)(3) organization built around the mission of promoting authentic Japanese arts and cultural traditions. It runs on the effort of people who believe in what it is doing. We try to be a part of that.

I handle IT when there is something technical to sort out. Noelia brings her sublimation and graphics work to the table when it fits. Our daughter signed up to volunteer at the kids tent for the upcoming Japan Festival Eustis on March 28th, 2026, 10am to 6pm in Downtown Eustis. If you are in central Florida that Saturday, it is worth the drive. Details at archingoaks.org/festival-event-info-page.html.

We are not just students who show up and leave. We want to give back to something that has given our family a lot more than sword technique.

What Tameshigiri Told Me on Friday the 13th

Tameshigiri is test cutting. Real blade. Rolled tatami soaked to approximate resistance. The air does not push back. The target does.

I am still cutting half reeds. That is the honest number. Not clean passes through the full roll. Half. I know exactly why. The Gyaku kesa, the diagonal upper cut, is where my form breaks down. The angle is not consistent. When the angle is off at the top of the arc, the mat catches wrong at the bottom, and the cut stops where it should not.

Last Friday was different. The kid had a camping event, which meant Noelia and I had a date night on the mat. Three reeds each instead of the usual two. More attempts, more data, more time to let the body recalibrate without keeping one eye on the clock.

By the third cut I had clean contact. Not perfect. Clean. Which means the form is in there. It means the first two were still the body finding itself and the third was the body delivering. That is the pattern I have to close the gap on. The goal is for the first cut to be what the third cut is now.

The mat does not lie and it does not offer encouragement. It gives you exactly what your form deserves.

Training with Your Family on the Floor

The family training structure is different now than it was in January. Once all three of us were on the mat together, the dynamic shifted, and the home sessions became something I run rather than something we muddle through together.

When I correct my daughter’s footwork, I have to know I am right. When Noelia asks why a particular transition moves the way it does, I have to have an answer that holds, not because I think I know but because I have put in the reps and cross-checked it against video from someone who has earned their rank. The senpai footage is the standard. If what I am teaching at home does not match what is on that recording, I am teaching it wrong and it will cost all three of us later.

We all made it back to the dojo this Tuesday. Last night we ran our first official home session for Toyama 1. We also sat down and worked through the written instructions so Noelia has the form documented in a way she can reference between sessions. The training guide is not just for me anymore. It is doing its job.

The dojo patch requires two batto and four Toyama kata. We know exactly what it demands. Evaluation has started. That is a different pressure than training for its own sake, and it is the right kind.

April and What It Means

There is an International Swordsmanship Seminar for Toyama Ryu and Battodo Iaido happening at Florida Budokan on April 4th and 5th, 2026. Sensei Velilla’s own teacher, traveling from Japan, will be there.

I want to test during that seminar. I want to stand in front of the lineage that connects this dojo to where this art was born and demonstrate that what we have built over three months is real.

But I will only do it if we are ready. Not ready meaning comfortable. Ready meaning the kata are clean, the principles are held, and the evaluation is something we earn rather than something we attempt because the opportunity is in front of us. There is a difference between seizing a moment and overreaching for one.

The next three weeks are the answer. Daily practice. The guide. The home sessions. The dojo Tuesday. Tameshigiri Friday. Fix the Gyaku kesa.

Arching Oaks describes itself as dedicated to the highest quality authentic Japanese cultural and martial arts experiences. The seminar is not a performance. It is a standard. We will meet it or we will wait for the next one.

The Same Fight, Different Floor

Fitness and the dojo are not separate tracks. They run on the same line.

The work with Tommy builds the base that makes the dojo work. The weight coming down from 289 toward 275 changes what is possible in stance. The consistency required to show up at the dojo twice a week is the same consistency required to run Tommy’s program on my own when he is unavailable, and to do the side planks that I do not enjoy but understand. DPE does not have an exception clause for exercises you would rather skip.

The dojo is forgiving in one way. Sensei meets you where you are and works with what you have. The art itself is not forgiving. The kata are the kata. The cutting requirement is the cutting requirement. There is no modified version of a clean cut.

Paul wrote it plainly. I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. He was not writing a training plan. He was describing what it costs to not be a hypocrite. The body will take you somewhere. The question is whether you are directing it or letting it direct you. I let mine direct me for a long time. I know exactly where it went.

The dojo is one of the places where I am learning to direct it instead.

DPE. Discipline. Precision. Execution.

The gap was two weeks. The gap did not erase the three months before it, and it did not win.

April 4th is sixteen days away. The Gyaku kesa will not fix itself.

We are back. Now we stay back.

If you are reading this and the next post does not mention the dojo, ask me about it. If April arrives and I have not written about the evaluation, ask about that too.