November 27, 2008
from the comments
Doc:
I met Bruce Lee as a kid, summer of ‘67, out in LA; my father often traveled for work. We were outside the office where my father had met a colleague when he suddenly pointed behind me and said, “Look, *Doc*, Kato!”
Walking up the street was a slender Chinese man, not all that tall. He might have been Kato, but mostly Kato wore that mask, right? But he stopped and said hello to my father and his colleague.
Anyhow, supercilious snot that I was, I asked him if what he did on TV was a fake. He just smiled and the next thing I knew the tennis ball (white – the only color made back then) I had been bouncing against the sidewalk was being batted this way and that by Lee’s hands, fists, knees, feet and head, almost too fast to see. To this day I’ve never met anyone with faster hands (and I studied in the Norris system in San Diego later on, even meeting and taking a lesson from Norris before he got too Hollywood.) As a finale, Lee let the ball drop into his right hand, and he sort of bowed, with the ball outstretched toward me. As I reached out to take it back, Lee suddenly popped in into the air and struck it with his fist. The damn thing popped. I mean, I walked over and picked it up and it was ruptured in a straight line. I believe everything ever written about him.
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When I read Doc’s recollection this morning, it just made my day.
Me, too–in a wistful kind of way.
I’m having a wistful kind of day.
you know, that memory was wistful the moment it occurred. yesterday we were talking about dreaming ourselves perfect again? the second Lee popped that tennis ball i knew that was not possible for me, never would be, and that unasked for insight made me incredibly sad. it wasn’t that i thought i could be Lee, or achieve his mastery, but until that exact second i had never had my physical limitations so starkly presented to me.
i still sometimes dream of that meeting. it never varies an iota from what happened except for this:
as Lee strikes the tennis ball time slows down to 3/4 fps and i can see the tennis ball stress and tear as Lee’s fist strikes it. then the ball is suddenly 20 feet away, a total ruin.
Dreaming ourselves perfect again.
[...] Best Bruce Lee story ever And real, unlike the Nokia commercial above. I asked him if what he did on TV (see video below) was a fake. He just smiled and the next thing I knew the tennis ball I had been bouncing against the sidewalk was being batted this way and that by Lee’s hands, fists, knees, feet and head, almost too fast to see. (via Clusterflock) Print This Post | Email This Post | SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Best Bruce Lee story ever”, url: “http://blogs.app.com/links/2008/12/02/best-bruce-lee-story-ever/” }); [...]