⊰ Ankle weights ⊱

Photo from the training scenes in the series “Blue Eye Samurai.”

Many years ago, toward the end of high school before I enlisted in the army, I was taking driving lessons. I paid for them with money I earned working at the most unhinged place in the world, (which absolutely deserves its own page).

The instructor figured out pretty quickly how to communicate with me. Saying “slow down, people” did not really work, but shouting “CAT!” definitely did.
In one lesson, on a highway, I was driving fast, the way I thought one was supposed to. The instructor said a sentence he had probably said to many students:
“What, do you have weights on your legs?”
My answer was apparently less standard: “Um… yes.”
When we could pull over at the exit ramp, I stopped on the side and took off the ankle weights I was wearing above my heels. The instructor was in shock and his jaw literally dropped.
The weights were always there, because my Kung-Fu instructor said I needed to get stronger, so I did.

The first time I ever contacted the instructor, he heard insane barking in the background and me telling my brother, “Take the cat,” which was the reason for the barking. He later told me he used to tell other students about me to break the ice.
He picked me up from the narrow streets of Jaffa, full of speed bumps that we say make driving there feel like riding a camel, and drove me to Holon, where the test would take place, including the Circle of Tears, Kugel Junction, back when it was still a massive roundabout before the tunnel.

The driving instructor stopped teaching forever after me. I like to think I had nothing to do with that…
I didn’t pass the actual driving test until more than two years later, after I was done with my army service.

By the way, I continued using those weights during my military service as well, on my arms as well. I trained with them on, and in tests where speed and accuracy mattered, I took them off, and suddenly the weapon felt lighter by a very noticeable full kilogram (2.2lb).