Yellow Belts

The rank ceremony was last night!  Makaila and I were both given our Yellow Belt decided.  It was a great evening, in that Danny and Isabella were there to cheer us on and see us receive our new belts. (I'll have to share pics with you later - I didn't take any with my camera and I haven't loaded Danny's from his phone just yet.)

The best part of the ceremony is that the Nationals, District and World Champs were honored with a new banner that will hang in our school, and the World Champs were presented with their World Champ uniforms framed to go on our Championship wall!!  Master Henderson shared a story about Ms. Aggen that had me in tears.  This young lady has been doing taekwondo for 16 years.  She left her hometown of Livingston (I Believe) to move to our area and train at this school (great teachers with lots of titles and experienced ranks).  She has made it to World Championship Competitions for a consecutive 9 years, each year coming so close and yet not winning.  Even tied twice for 1st place and still didn't win.  This year she won WORLD CHAMP for forms.  His speech was filled with such endearment, pride, and love for this kid (as if she were literally one of his own children), that it made her cry (and me too).  It was so cute to watch - I think I even saw Master Henderson wipe away a tear.

Even better than that was after this presentation - he made it a point to explain to us how he started in Taekwondo, and reiterate the rules of no jewelry.  How the only exceptions are wedding rings, Master rings, and or a 5th degree achievement Onyx ring.  Master Rose (from another school) presented him with his 5th degree ring once he reached that achievment, and how much it meant to him and so forth.  He then went on to tell us that in all his years of having this school (Since 1994) and teaching that there has only been one student who has shown sure determination, and dedication and focus to achieve the goal of becoming a 5th degree black belt, and he wanted to continue tradition and present her with the 5th degree ring once presented to him years ago.  It was Ms. Aggen.  She was bawling!!  And honestly so was I.  It was so touching and so awe inspiring to see this presentation and to hear such heartfelt accolades for her. This young lady has amazing talent, she is so disciplined, and respectful and kind, that I feel honored to have been a part of this celebration in her honor!!!  Congrats Mr. Aggen!!

Now off that pride high - let me also fill you in on the worse part of the ceremony.  In case you guys haven't noticed I am pretty proud of my rugrats.  I brag on them often, and love them abundantly.  Last night, after the ceremony, I hugged Makaila and congratulated her and told her how proud I was of her.  We got into the line of people waiting to congratulate Ms Aggen, and one of the other teachers said "Aren't you two a pretty picture", (we were walking with my arm around her talking) which I thought was sweet, but Makaila shrugged away from me and got into the line with a "whatever" comment.  She did this laughingly, probably thinking she was being cute, but the look of disapproval in Mrs. Wilkinson's face, and the stab of pain I felt in my heart were not good feelings.  I know that I need to understand that she is a teenager, and I'm not cool in her eyes, but the truth of the matter was that I was hurt and even more disappointed that she would do this and in front of our instructors no less. As if that weren't enough, I asked her to take a picture with me, and she said "I don't want a pic with you I want to take one with Master Henderson."  I told her to stop being rude and that if she thought it was cute to talk to me like that it wasn't, that she was being disrespectful and it needed to stop.  She apologized immediately, but it still hurt. 

I get that at 13 your mom is not cool, and I get that I can be smothering at times...but my feelings were hurt. The insecure, reassurance seeking woman in me was heartbroken.  I wanted her to be as proud of me as I was of her.  Hell, in all honesty its for her that I started taking the classes - so she wouldn't do it alone, and we could have something to do together.   I mentioned it again on the way home (which I probably shouldn't have) and Danny got mad at her and proceeded to tell her she needed to cut her crap out and yell at her about  it.  I know she didn't intentionally mean to hurt me, and most likely was playing around with me thinking we were joking around, but it diminished that feeling of excitement and joy. 

After that it was showers and bed for the night. 

God - help me to be the mother that my kids need me to be for them, and that you have called me to be.  Give me some of my cool back! Help me to love them the way you loved.  Help me to be secure and confident in my successes and my actions that I would not be so easily wounded by others.  Help my kids to understand me and my love for them.  Thank you for our blessings and successes, and all of those still to come.  Amen!