The last trip I was able to take before Covid-19 erupted in the United States was to Columbus, Ohio. I went there to take a defensive knife course from a fellow blogger, Greg Ellifritz of Active Response Training. I've been enjoying his articles and his posts on social media for years, so when the "stars aligned" and there was a course within a few hours of where I was staying, I jumped at the chance.

Why did I decide to take a defensive knife course?

When I told friends about the course I was taking, a lot of them asked why I wanted to take that instead of another firearms course to improve my skills. Firearms courses are great, and I'm a big fan of guns, but the fact of the matter is that there are more and more places you can't take your gun these days without risking federal felony charges. As well, I travel internationally quite a lot (when there isn't a pandemic going on) and I wanted a quick-to-learn option for overseas, too.

More than that, I had a personal experience that made me realize I wasn't at all prepared to use the knife that's always in my pocket.

One day late last summer, I was enjoying a cool day in a beautiful shaded park in a safe part of the city. It doesn't matter where the park was because a situation like this could happen anywhere.

I sat on a bench with a book, splitting my time between reading and people watching beside a beautiful fountain. When a young man who appeared to be in his late 20s or early 30s came to sit beside me, I'd already seen him.

He began to talk with me and I instantly felt uncomfortable. I said, "I'm sorry but I'm just waiting here for my boyfriend. He'll be here any minute." I hoped the man would leave when I said that, but he wasn't at all put off by it. After the de-escalation course that I took from Dr. Tammy Yard-McCracken of 500Rising I knew that this was a bad sign.

I got up to leave the situation. He also stood up and began swearing at me and making obscene comments. He grabbed my left arm and began to pull me away from the bench.

I had my knife open in my pocket and in my right hand as I struggled to get free and then I froze. "Oh crap!" I thought. I had no idea what the most effective way to use it would be. Did I cut his arm that was grasping my wrist? Did I try to stick the knife in his eyeball? Should I randomly slash away at him? He was a lot bigger and stronger than me, and I knew whatever my choice was I needed to make it count because I was unlikely to get another strike if I failed to make enough of an impression with the first one.

It sounds like I stood there frozen for 5 minutes pondering this but the thoughts rushed through my head at lightning speed – it was probably less than 2 seconds. A group of people turned down the sidewalk where we were struggling, I managed to break his hold, and I took off running toward the group. When I reached them, a couple of the gentlemen in the group gave chase but the would-be attacker was already gone.