Arm Bars And Leg Locks

I was in the gym locker room this morning, minding my own business, when I was drawn into a conversation against my will. Not that I actually participated, but I did eavesdrop shamelessly. Normally at the gym I ignore other people's discussions, and the locker room is a no-eye-contact zone, so it's mostly just 'hi-bye' if you see someone you know. But not this time. Two guys met and I just couldn't help listening in.
   They were MMA fighters.
   For those of you who have been living under a rock for the past ten years, MMA is Mixed Martial Arts fighting, 'the battle in the octagon.' At least UFC uses an octagon, others don't. It's like boxing and kickboxing with grappling thrown in. High-enery, high-octane fights, and there's always blood. Makes me feel sixteen again just watching it.
   Anyway, these two guys recognized each other from MMA events they'd participated in, but I didn't recognize them at all. They introduced themselves and then got to talking. You might think that listening to two guys talk about where to get boxing equipment and how to punch past someone's guard might be boring, but it wasn't. I was actually surprised by how fascinating I found everything they said.
   I once spent an entire flight from Dulles Airport to San Antonio wedged between two flight engineers. I thought that would be interesting but I was wrong. Dead wrong. I had never wanted to claw my eyes out from boredom before that flight. And I figured that listening to these two fighters talk would be the same thing. Wrong.
   They were both older, mid-thirties, on the lower rungs of the MMA ladder and not going to climb any higher. They had day jobs outside of fighting, so they couldn't get completely beaten up in a fight because they had to go to work the next day. They knew which promoters were honest and which were crooks. They had families, wives and children that benefited from the little extra money fighting brought in. They were lamenting the loss of speed that comes with aging, but knew they had an edge in experience. Kind of like old wolves in the pack, they knew their time was past but they were going to fight on until they just couldn't do it any more.
   It was a fascinating glimpse into a world I'm not part of, making guys who are superhuman on TV seem all to fragile and normal, beset by the same problems and worries everybody has. One guy even said 'I got so much running through my brain now it's hard to turn it off and just fight.'
   I also learned that the economic downturn has hit the boxing supply stores hard too. There's a sale this weekend on gym equipment, but it's priced so cheap now - over half off - that it's now affordable for your home. So if you want a six-foot-tall Muy Thai heavy bag, let me know, I'll hook you up, evidently this weekend they're less than a hundred bucks.