Kathey
I met Kathey in 1987. She was walking through Pease Park, wearing a black hakama and white, quilted gi, the traditional attire of a Japanese martial artist. At the time, she was a Shodan, first degree black belt in aikido, and the dojo where she practiced, Austin Ki Aikido, had only been founded four years earlier. In early 1988, the dojo's founder left Austin for Colorado. As the most senior student remaining, she assumed the role of Head Instructor, not because of ambitions to run a dojo, but because she wanted a place to practice and improve her art. She loved the movement of aikido and enjoyed the community of practice that surrounded it. For the next 25 years, she was the heartbeat and head of the dojo. During that time, my best conversations with Kathey were in the dojo's parking lot after the evening's class. She believed she was a reincarnated Korean warrior who was cruel and vicious in a previous life. And that belief drove her in her study of aikido. The training ...
