The Champ

We harassed Bud all week last week to practice his Tae Kwon Do form. All week he gave us a hard time about it. Whined that he had forgotten it. That his stomach hurt. That he just didn’t feel like it. He wouldn’t do it in front of anyone. I was more than a little bit nervous when we arrived for his tournament on Saturday; worried that he would just phone it in.

(Ok, I was on the verge of throwing up, but only because I had to drive in to the city by myself—which I HATE—and my GPS signal crapped out on the way there, so I had to wing it. It took me a long time to recover. Aaaaaanyway…)

His teacher had told me that he would be one of the first to go, so I figured we’d be in and out. His teacher was wrong though, and we ended up being there for almost 2 hours. He was in a competitive division (where you get real number scores, i.e. 9.45 instead of the baby scores of “super awesome!”) but there was nobody from his age division (age 4-6) there, so they put him up against the older kids—two 7-year-olds.

When it was finally his turn, Hub, who had come a little later me, Lucy and I joined him on the competition floor. Bud is sort of famous among the schools because, well, he’s Bud, so many people came by to watch. The other children, one being a belt lower and the other a belt higher than Bud, went first and were nervous through their forms. When Bud came up, I held my breath. He was loud and confident as he announced himself and his form. He was right on as he went through his moves. Hub and I were kind of blown away. We should have known though; he’s been doing this since he was 4. He turned around while the judges tallied their scores. He got mid and high 9’s. Hub and I knew he had won, but he did not.

After sparring, the children lined up. The judges announced 3rd place, and then 2nd place. You could see the look on his face as he realized he had come in first. I couldn’t have been more proud. He was ridiculously proud of himself. He also got a first place medal for his sparring.

He has them displayed at home now, with the participation trophies he got from his non-competitive tournaments, and with the 2nd place medal he got in his first competitive tournament a few months back. We had various company this weekend, and he proudly showed them all.

My son, who will graduate from Kindergarten tomorrow btw, is a superstar.