stabbing Santa Claus

Viewers paused on the bridge above the salle. They looked puzzled - even slightly concerned. I don't know if they had watched fencing before but they probably hadn't seen festive fencing before.

Because of the icy pavements, I hadn't visited all the shops I'd intended. My fencing kit was sadly short of tinsel. However, before the snow fell, I had bought a pair of felt reindeer antlers, They had the added advantage of small lights that would flash cheerfully whenever I pressed a button while the headband emitted a faint tune. I wasn't sure that "Jingle Bells" was quite what I needed to strike fear into the heart of my opponents, but it was certainly festive. I wound some of last year's fluffly lilac tinsel round my wrist. Then I looked round for an opponent.

I started by fencing foil against a boy in Christmas hat with a gold-tinselled sword. All around me santas were battling reindeer, using foil and sabre. The floor was acquiring a light dusting of shredded, glittering tinsel.

Perhaps the best costume involved gold tinsel sewn to fencing jackets and breeches combined with orange gloves, trimmed with white fur and beads, a santa hat and - the winning touch - a long white Santa beard apparently descending from the fencing mask. "Epée?" I asked Santa.

I pressed the button on my antlers so that I could advance to the reassuring sound of "Jingle Bells." Sadly the lights had stopped working after a few hits. It was a little hard to adopt a threatening demeanour and I was worried that my sword might tangle in Santa's beard. Still, we fenced for some time and I took great pleasure in stabbing Santa Claus.

It wasn't the most vigorous or dedicated evening of fencing, though I did get some really useful advice on wrist action in parrying. I'd known before that I needed to make my attacks and parries far more precise but there's a difference between knowing the theory and suddenly feeling the practice click into place. The coach who spent time with me told me exactly what I needed to know at just the right time - I hope I can hold that knowledge through the holidays. Many fencers paused to photograph bouts, to exchange cards or simply to watch the fencers. Someone borrowed a large broom from the leisure centre staff and a foilist and sabreuse spent time clearing the floor of Christmas sparkle.

The evening ended with a visit to the pub. I cadged a lift from one of the coaches (in a jaguar!) and enjoyed a glass of mulled ale and more conversation with my fellow fencers. Sadly, the leisure centre is closed between Christmas and New Year and I shan't be fencing again till mid-January. However, I can look forward to the fencing club Christmas dinner in the New Year, just as all the festivities are winding down into January bleakness.

Merry Christmas - and I hope you have a happy and peaceful New Year - apart from whatever amount of enjoyable and consensual violence you would choose.

missing

My blade glided harmlessly past my opponent's forearm towards his heart. I accelerated forward - and missed. I didn't just miss his heart. I missed his chest altogether. My blade slid under his arm and stabbed the air, as if I were taking part in a peculiarly incompetent stage fight. Then he hit me without difficulty.

Luckily the evening wasn't all as bad as that, though I was still exhausted from the previous week at work. The chef said she was tired too and we took a break when the coach taking footwork practice kept us in an exhausting routine so step, lunge, reprise faster, step forward, step back, lunge, reprise faster, step back. My calves and thighs hurt after only three or four sequences. I'm still not as fit as I was before succumbing to policeman's foot and then falling from the loft.

I don't think the chef can have been all that tired because I managed only a few hits against her. She was so much faster and more accurate than me that I felt compelled to mention that I had, at least, beaten her at Scrabulous. (It doesn't happen often - I won one of three games we were playing simultaneously and she won the other two. )

The chef's lunge gets longer every week. I suspect mine has a tendency to look more like an energetic shuffle. The chef is probably helped by her energetic cycling and regular visits to the gym. She's taken up running too, which seems to involve an obstacle course of geese, gooseherds and children's tricycles as well as congratulatory admirers. She duggested I join her but it doesn't seem a very good idea. Apart from continuing pain in my heel, I'm pathetically slow. She'd probably do at least two circuits to my one - if I managed one.

I did, however, make a discovery. The chef is good at defending against hits from above, because she's one of the smaller fencers in the club. While it seems obvious that, as the taller fencer, I should be able to hit her from above, I have more success hitting from below her arm. My best hits were to her thigh as she advanced or began to lunge. (It was probably a mistake to tell her this after we had fenced.)

I managed more hits against my second opponent of the evening - a better and taller fencer. There were disasters, like missing his chest, but I also managed a decent number of arm hits. I thought he was probably letting me hit him but the chef reckoned he was tired. That made me feel better.

After two opponents the tiredness was the real victor of the evening. I wanted to leave while I could still cycle home without swerving or falling off. The chef and I left together. and I got home safely, although I did swerve from time to time. Unfortunately my plans for next week mean I'll miss the one-hit epee (again). I was sorry to realise that but pleased to find that August fencing was suggested. As I said goodbye and "see you in a fortnight," I looked forward to more chances of practice - I'm beginning to feel almost fit. Alas! - I heard a day later that the floor of the hall is to be replaced. It will be out of use for some weeks. That probably means no fencing till September.

I'll try to work on lunges, speed and accuracy - on my own. It doesn't feel quite right. Fencing isn't the same without the immediate inducement of stabbing somebody.

squires

I think I could do with a squire - not that I could afford one. I don't like the idea of having a servant but a squire might be a sort of apprentice, who could undertake helpful tasks while viewing me with respect.

The chef occasionally undertakes the sort of tasks I might entrust to a squire. For instance, she helps me zip up my jacket. (If I'm ever rich, I'm going to buy a fencing jacket with a zip at the side.) Sometimes she holds my sword bag while I get onto my bike. But I'm afraid that, as she admitted at the pub after fencing, she doesn't view me with the respect I'd get from a squire. For instance, she watches me get on my bike with fencing kit for the entertainment value.

While I lack a proper squire, there are plenty of people who help along the way. For instance, there's the cobbler. At the chef's suggestion, I took my sword bag, which had an awkward hole just the size of a foil-blade, to the local cobbler. I don't think he'd ever been asked to mend a sword bag before but he assessed the task, worked out what would be required, asked for £3.95 and gave me a receipt for the bag. When I returned two days later, he didn't demand the receipt - for some reason he remembered me. He'd fixed the bag with a neat leather patch which reinforces the whole bottom of the bag.

Another helper came to the rescue at fencing. This time it wasn't me who required help but the newish left-handed foilist (and occasional eppeeist). When I entered the women's changing rooms I found her searching for a lost earring - a special one that had been a 21st birthday present. Apparently she'd taken both off carefully before putting them carefully in a plastic bag - only to discover that the bag had a hole in the bottom. One earring was safe but the other had vanished. Together we searched everywhere - even a rubbish bin - and came to the conclusion that there was only one place left: inside the grille of the radiator behind the bench. The chef joined us as we headed to the reception to ask for help. A young man accompanied us back to the women's changing room. He assessed the problem and realised that the radiator would have to be dismantled - then told us to continue fencing while he looked. He came into the hall half an hour later with the missing earring in his hand. I noticed that he'd cut himself dismantling and reassembling the grille. He was blushing - I think with pride in his achievement but he may also have been embarrassed by the time spent in the women's changing room.

Either the cobbler of the dismantler of radiators would make an excellent squire. They have such useful skills. I think the chef would prefer to recruit her hairdresser who is called George and, in her view, "lovely." He certainly did an excellent job of cutting her hair, though she worried that it wasn't staying straight and in place under her fencing mask. Apparently George is also expensive so perhaps he wouldn't want to be a squire, even though the chef is planning her move to Paris which would provide him with opportunities for travel and a new clientele. And I fear I don't have the fencing skills that a good squire might wish me to impart.

Lately, I have not been fencing well. I like to blame tiredness, since I've been short of sleep. But I fear there are other causes: an insistent ache in my right shoulder and the continuing problem of policeman's foot. And then there's ageing. Perhaps I can't ever expect to get any better, which is a sad thought. Sometimes I wonder if I'll continue fencing after the summer. I'd like to continue, I think - but am I good enough to go on?

Life in the medium lane

The chef opted out of fencing this week. She'd intended to go but the lure of gin and The Apprentice on TV lured her away from the salle (OK,. the leisure centre). I haven't watched The Apprentice but feel I'm in a minority. It's discussed on Facebook, in all the papers and at fencing.

The hall was still crowded and there were eight other epeeists - all male - as well as sabreurs, foilists and a large number of beginners and intermediates. I was tired from work, worry and insomnia and didn't have the energy to seek out bouts. I did my best, accepting three offers, trying to keep my guard up. "Remember your elbow," a fencer hissed," as I attached my body wire.

I remembered my elbow and noticed the way it crookedly evaded the protection of the guard. I took a few hits, though not on my elbow, and also managed a few - I'm not sure how. A couple of hits to the forearm pleased me but too much of the evening passed in a blur of exhaustion.

For the past two weeks, fencers have been plagued by technical problems. Last week, the foilists and sabreurs were having problems with an electric box which decided it would work only for epeeists. A small group of fencers stood around making helpful suggestions about further tests that would locate the fault. This week, an epeeist was affected as two tiny screws flew out of the button at the end of his blade. After ten minutes in which several of us stared and patted the floor, both were located and the attempt began to re-attach the button. "This needs small hands," the epee's owner groaned, so I found a small intermediate fencer and asked him to help. I suspect it's the fencing equivalent of finding a child to go up a chimney.

Eventually the blade was restored to health, I had another bout and decided to leave in daylight. My arm was hurting - it still is, though there aren't many bruises. I think I must have been holding it at an awkward angle. Cycling was slightly tricky and at one point I swerved as I approached one of the sleeping policemen. (Note: "sleeping policeman" is a name given to a bump in the road that slows down the traffic.)

I think I'm moving as well as before the fall now but I still need opportunities for exercise without putting too much pressure on my foot - the "policeman's foot" continues. Today I had the chance to go swimming - a friend offered me a lift to the pool. I'm even more out of practice at swimming than fencing and decided beforehand that I'd set myself a limit of 30 lengths (750 metres).

I was tired at first but the tiredness receded as I swam alternate lengths of breast stroke and back stroke. It wasn't exciting like fencing - and I carry on worrying as I go up and down. There were fewer people in the pool than at a usual fencing session. My friend - also out of practice - headed, as usual, to the slow lane. Before I took up fencing I'd have been there too.

These days, I swim in the medium lane. Sometimes people overtake me - today two girls discussing their social lives easily overtook without pausing in their conversation. The medium lane makes its own demands. Sometimes I have to struggle to keep up. Swimming in the medium lane may not see much of an achievement but I'm pleased to be there.

"Fail again. Fail better."

It would be nice to win sometimes but, apart from the occasional lucky bout, it's not going to happen. At the club championship there was a moment in pools when I was 4-1 up. Then my opponent either started concentrating or saw one of the errors I was making and won every point. 5-4 isn't a disgraceful defeat, especially in foil which I barely fence these days, but I'd have liked to win.

At least I didn't come up against my son, who was doing rather better despite very little practice. He won his first D.E. before being eliminated.

Then there was a pause to watch the other bouts and the tightest final I've ever seen, between a very good 14-year-old and a foil specialist aiming at the master-of-arms trophy. The points were long and exhaustingly fought. It was six seconds short of the 9-minute mark when the 14-year-old drew level and the score stood at 13 all. The older fencer fleched and scored. 14-13 and 2 seconds left. We all knew what had to come next. At 9 minutes the match would be awarded to the leading fencer. The 14-year-old had no choice. He fleched, but his opponent was waiting and caught him with a hit, just as time was called.


There was a brief pause before epee began. Non-fencers may have a glamorous idea of a fencing championship. There are moments of glamour, when passing children pause and stand in awe. It should be dramatic and romantic and lunch should involve a lavish feast with silver tankards of good ale or glasses of deep red wine.

It's not quite like that. There are a couple of vending machines, selling cold drinks, crisps and chocolate. They can help but, as Sunday lunch, they're not the best feast imaginable. We'd brought picnics and flasks of tea and coffee to the leisure centre and nibbled between bouts or while watching. Strong black coffee kept me going (more or less) during the morning and cheese, biscuits and apples were a satisfactory lunch. Jaffa cakes were produced and shared. It was cold in the leisure centre, even in fencing gear so it seemed a shame to discard the foil lame I'd borrowed.

In epee, I lost focus. I forgot how to fence. Usually foil helps me prepare for epee but at the championship I was slow, inaccurate and lacking in strategy. I recall - with amazement - one nice wrist hit, but apart from that I offered no real opposition. So of course, I did what I'd decided in advance and proceeded to sabre.

The decisions was ludicrous. I'd held a sabre for thirty minutes in total, in three short sessions. I thought I could just about remember the grip and I had a hazy idea of the en garde position. I knew three defensive positions, fve ways to hit and two parries. The club is stronger in sabre than any other weapon and the keen sabreurs were raring to go. My main aim was not to blink when the blade hit my mask. At least sabre has the warmest kit.


By this stage, the level of aggression from fencers was pretty high. The master-of-arms title was wide open and all the sabreurs were keen to do their best. But at last I wasn't the only woman in the hall (though I was the oldest person). A sabreuse arrived with another woman fencer in support and both offered advice and encouragement. The most useful advice was "They won't be so aggressive with you." Watching the opening pool fights, I hoped this was right.

I imagine my opponents must have held back - probably rather obviously - as I managed occasional hits. The women cheered me in my first bout, which helped, and there was a cheer when I managed a cut. Most of my hits were flailing accidents since I had no idea of appropriate technique but one cut to the inner arm delighted me. And in the D.E. I went out 15-5 - the same score as I'd managed in epee. In epee that was disgraceful but in sabre creditable. I finished the day, seven and a half hours after I began, thinking that at least I was still standing and I'd only fallen over once.

Walking home, I was exhilarated. I'd fenced all three weapons for the first (possibly the last) time. But again I wondered why I fence. I'm not going to be a good fencer. For a few years, I may manage to improve a little, but it's a continuing battle against age. In a few years I'll start getting worse.

The backpack with mask, jacket, breeches and plastron was a familiar weight. The swords jangled gently in the bag on my shoulder. I looked at the stars and thought the most hopeful motto I could find came from Waiting for Godot: "No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better."


Note:
In my previous post, I mentioned the case of Jahongir Sidikov. His deportation to Uzbekistan has been delayed, pending a review, but the British government has stated that deporting dissidents to Uzbekistan is government policy. I can hardly believe this. Anyone who wishes to learn about Uzbekistan, should read Craig Murray's book: Murder in Samarkand in Britain, or, in the United States, Dirty Diplomacy: the Rough-and-Tumble Adventures of a Scotch-Drinking, Skirt-Chasing, Dictator-Busting and Thoroughly Unrepentant Ambassador Stuck on the Frontline of the War against Terror. (That American title has a certain something - length for a start.) If you wish to help Jahongir, please follow the links, search on google and do what you can. (There's a Facebook group too.)

No-one to stab ....

Summer hasn't exactly arrived. There are regular thunderstorms, torrential downpours and tales of flooding in parts of the country. However, according to institutions and travel agents, this is summer, and regular fencing has stopped.

It wouldn't be so bad if it was hot, or even warm. But I'm shivering slightly and huddled up in my club hoodie as I type this. I'd appreciate the opportunity of wearing a plastron and fencing jacket. Those white socks and knee breeches are ever so warm and the mask, once you get used to it, is pretty cosy. And there's nothing like a vigorous bout or two in cold weather.

But what I really miss is not the warmth of fencing but the activity. I want to try to break through someone's defence and make a quick, unexpected hit. I even want to marvel at my opponent's superior skill and puzzle about how to deal with a better, taller, stronger fencer. I miss group footwork practice and the games we play in warm-up. Of course, I also miss the friendship of fellow fencers. Facebook and the club website aren't much of a substitute.

I read on the website that our fencing club may move to another leisure centre - one that I'd find hard to reach by bus or train, esepcially after work. I hope that doesn't happen, though of course it might be best for the club. I've been fencing for nearly three years now. I may not be much good as a fencer but I really enjoy it. These days, it's part of who I am.