For most people retirement is a time to slow down,
relax, and travel to all those out of the 
way places that they only heard of.
For Ed
Martin being retired is a full time job. A pilot for TWA during the seventies and
eighties. Ed was often away from home. Worried about the safety of his wife and three
daughters. He looked into various self defense methods. Training
himself in several, but found
nothing that really fit until discovering Ninjutsu.
Studying under Ninjutsu's only
fully accredited practitioner, Masaaki
Hatsumi. Ed switched over from karate.
His daughter's followed. Time passed. Ed became one of a handful of
15th degree black belts
(or Dan as the title is called in Japan) worldwide. His daughters acquired a
reputation for dealing decisively with school yard bullies, rude dates and other
annoyances. People began asking for lessons and pointers in the art of Ninjutsu. Ed became a full time instructor.
Which made
him a very busy guy converting the
family barn into a proper training area or Dojo and taking on students. He returns to Japan each spring for advanced instruction.
He is also often asked to officiate in Ninjutsu's growing number of national and international
exhibitions. As a teacher of Ninjutsu he was asked to
pen a local newspaper's column on self defense. Noted for his prose
he was asked to become editor of a community newsletter, The East Penn
Commentator.
Finding he still had time on his
hands he went on to produce a video tape entitled Self Defense For Everyone. Which
earned an award of merit from Masaaki Hatsumi and an suggestion by Ninjutsu's
Grand Master to make a sequel.
Not that Ed has anything against
being relaxed. He enjoys the quiet moment as much as any one, but there
are things that need doing, or writing, or in the case of that second video,
filming. One day when everything is a bit more settled he might take a
vacation from being retired long enough to visit those out of the way places.
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