ELISABETH SHUE IS RALPH MACCHIO
How To Become the Next Karate Kid
Get Daniel LaRusso’d
All my life I wanted to be the Karate Kid. I wanted the one-legged kick, the Bonzai bush, and Elisabeth Shue flirting with me on a Southern California beach. It never happened.
No one ever asked me to paint their fence, wax their car or move to California in an old station wagon that I pushed downhill while my single mother stepped on the gas.
I had no older male mentors who trimmed small Japanese bushes in the back of a dilapidated residential hotel. The only older men I met wanted to teach me something — but it wasn’t karate. No Bonzai for me.
I cannot balance, especially on tall seaside tree trunks. Whenever I go into tree pose in yoga, this tree falls in the forest and I make a sound. Son of a bitch.
I’d all but given up on my Ralph Macchio dreams when it finally happened. It wasn’t because I finally signed up for karate or met Elisabeth Shue. I think Elisabeth Shue and I would get along great but we’re both 50 now so who’s gonna hire us and which one of us would be Ralph Macchio?
My Karate Kid moment came when I joined swim team and it was clear my coach was my own personal Mr. Miyagi. You think I’m too old for swim team but you could be…
