It was my cousin's outdoor wedding and my little girl, Lena, was the flower girl. The wedding itself went very well and Lena was, of course, precious. It certainly wasn't the disaster I, as the father of the flower girl, imagined it might be. The festivities had shifted over to a big tent where the reception was taking place. As I was walking through the snack line, I noticed that at the end of the line was one of those chocolate fountains that you can dip food in.
I love chocolate. My wife is a 5th degree black belt Chocoholic, and that has rubbed off on me during 6 years of marriage (I think I'm a second degree brown belt, now). So naturally, the chocolate fountain and the items around it had my attention. I dipped a couple of cherries, some pineapple, a pretzel stick, and my pièce de résistance, a giant strawberry on a stick twice dipped. I grabbed a cup of punch and headed back to where my family was sitting.
When I passed my younger brother, Caleb, he reached up and took the strawberry off my plate. I'm generally a passive person. If someone takes my seat, I'll find another one. If you cut in line, I probably won't say a thing. However, I love my food. If you try to take food off my plate, there will be words. If chocolate is involved, there will be injuries. Both of my younger brothers know this, but they like to play games like this with me from time to time. Probably because I was the typical mean older brother in my youth (or before I found judo ;-).
I quickly set my cup of punch down on a table and grabbed Caleb's wrist before he could get my chocolate strawberry to his mouth. I still had my plate in my other hand, so I couldn't really do anything but hold on. He tried to stretch his arm down towards the ground, which then made it easy for me to set my plate on the ground and concentrate both of my hands on my dessert. I turned his wrist in, straightened his arm, stood back up, and tucked his arm under mine. As I plucked my chocolate strawberry from his now limp hand, I suddenly realized I had my brother in a textbook standing waki-gatame. I didn't even think about it until I had achieved my objective. After I let Caleb go, he sullenly consoled himself by drinking my punch, but I still had my chocolate covered strawberry. My wife later told me she was proud of me for defending my chocolate.
So there you have it, I used actual judo training in a real life situation. No injuries were sustained by anyone and the situation was resolved with maximum efficiency.
I learned that day that victory is sweet, especially chocolate covered victory.
