January

When I was in high school, my honorary grandparents offered to pay my way through college. They didn’t have any children of their own, and we were very close with them.

The kids I went to school with either knew what they wanted to do with their future, or they were going to school to party. I had no idea what I wanted to study and wasn’t a big partier. Because I felt I was wasting their money, I turned down the offer.

After graduation, I got a job working for the local police department. There weren’t any women officers then, so I went along with the men to arrest women, did the parking control, help with traffic control at different events, got to work basketball games etc. It was great fun for an eighteen year old kid. All the men at the precinct treated me like their baby sister and were always looking out for me. But, something was missing. A friend had recommended a counselor she was seeing, so I started going to him (more on that story later). I ended up starting classes at the junior college in town and that’s where I started taking martial art classes.

As I stated before, when I first stepped and punched, it all just clicked. I absolutely fell in love with Taekwondo. After the semester was over, I transferred to the Taekwondo School whose instructors taught at the college. My love for the sport just continued to grow. Any chance I got, I was training. I was in every available class, and working on my own all the time. Finally, I found that missing piece in my life.

At that time, I was working at a local financial institution but quit when the owner and head instructor of the Taekwondo school offered me a job working in the office and teaching. My goal was to have my own school, so this was a perfect fit for me. I was very excited to begin.

It didn’t take long to realize that martial arts was totally male dominated. In our association, I could count the female school owners on one hand. Having worked at the male dominated police department, I believed having my own school one day was still in sight.

The men I worked with before were truly good guys. The male instructors in the martial art world were totally different. These men acted like mini gods and ran the schools like the military. When an order was given, you complied. Don’t ever question what they said or did, just do it. The association was all about money and power.

Many were having affairs with their students. Women groupies were everywhere. There was always partying and drinking going on at tournaments.

I will never forget one of our out of town trips. A large group of us were at a McDonalds when some of the head leaders of the association came in. We were all ordered to the attention position to bow and show respect to these men. These instructors who were adulterers, alcoholics and some abusers, made us spout out the tenets of Taekwondo and worship them and we did because our futures could be cut in half by one of them with a snap of a finger.

Some of these men that are still living, to this day still believe they are mini gods. A few years back, I went to a martial art convention in Las Vegas. In the lobby as I was signing in for the next days activities, one of these (old now) men came up to me and tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to him and he put his finger up to his cheek. He wanted me to give him a kiss. Oh, I knew exactly who he was and I looked him directly in the eyes and said “Yeah, that’s not happening” and turned back to the girl who was checking me in. Her eyes were huge. The guy and his entourage were stunned I guess, because it took him a minute to turn and go the other way.

I have so many stories I could tell about the culture of the martial arts during those years. They have helped shape me into the instructor I am today. When I teach, I try to build students up and not tear them down. I have a skill that I like to share, but that skill doesn’t make me anything but what I am, a human like everyone else.

Mary