{"id":6696,"date":"2015-09-23T14:16:05","date_gmt":"2015-09-23T19:16:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/?p=6696"},"modified":"2026-01-21T13:07:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T18:07:09","slug":"bas-relief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/blog\/bas-relief\/","title":{"rendered":"Bas relief"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AnYesterday I threw out karate belts I earned between the ages of 18 and 20. They were musty. Hidden away, like all the stuff I haven\u2019t found places to display yet. I like space. I value space. Open, empty space and shelves that say, \u201cWe don\u2019t need to be filled to feel important.\u201d What they need to be filled with is essentials for survival, but that\u2019s another story.<\/p>\n

A friend on Facebook asked me how I could bear to throw them away because I earned them. I see her point; they are a trophy and I did earn them. All these years I have not wanted to throw them out (if I thought about it), but something\u2019s been changing in me for a while now, about carrying baggage and grudges.<\/p>\n

I carry a lot of grudges that I\u2019m shedding slowly. The one I may never be able to shed, the one I need to shed most, the one I have to consciously shed every day, is the one against myself.<\/p>\n

My 7-year-old self for an embarrassing moment.
\nMy 12-year-old self for an embarrassing moment and hurting someone\u2019s feelings.
\nMy 15-year-old self for something that should have gotten me arrested for assault (that\u2019s the one that\u2019s killing me right now).
\nMy 18-year-old self for being starry-eyed, stupid, and too immature to be let loose on the world with no guidance.
\nMy 25-year-old self for \u2026<\/p>\n

And all the years before and in between up until yesterday. I\u2019m sure today I will do something today that I will find beyond the pale after I\u2019ve committed the offense.<\/p>\n

What prompted this? I don\u2019t know, but I think it was when I had to cut off a dear friend I\u2019d had for years. The relationship had gotten toxic years ago, but since we were separated by distance, it wasn\u2019t an issue. Then I got on Facebook and that changed everything. I tried to resurrect it, but that\u2019s always a bad idea.<\/p>\n

Crash.<\/p>\n

Burn.<\/p>\n

I hate that. I\u2019m one to let friendships fade and it\u2019s only in the past few years they\u2019ve flamed out and left me grieving for a while. Those you can never patch up.<\/p>\n

Being married has taught me the value of talking things through instead of letting things flame out. It\u2019s difficult for me, and I have had to evaluate each to figure out if it was worth it. In two very recent cases (one yesterday, as a matter of fact), it was more than worth it. Their friendship means far more to me than walking away feeling righteous and hurt and angry and guilty. People are more understanding (of relationships, of my toxicity) than I ever gave them credit for. I faded away so as to not poison the relationship myself because, in the words of Jack Burton, \u201cSooner or later I rub everybody the wrong way.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

I realized I was making very slow progress on letting things go when a Twitter friend I\u2019d had for years cut me off in a blaze of fury for \u2026 nothing important. That was the second time he\u2019s done it. I grieved the first time. Deeply. It took nine months for him to cool off. This time \u2026 I didn\u2019t care. It was time for that relationship to go bye-bye.<\/p>\n

Anyway, in thinking about my friend\u2019s question about trashing my karate belts, trying to explain it, I realized that what I got from my time in karate were life lessons and examples to follow (or not). I\u2019m still operating on the principles two men (both my teachers) taught me.<\/p>\n

Those two men could not be more different:<\/p>\n

<\/a>Number One<\/strong> was a charismatic lawyer, a salesman if you will. I am (was) susceptible to charismatic people, but I learned my lesson about that. Really well. Occasionally, bits and pieces of him come out in my characters. The bad ones. But. He said something to me one time that I have struggled with ever since and really sort of defined me. At the time it horrified me, because somewhere in my entrepreneurial soul, I knew he was right.<\/p>\n

He said, \u201cYou paid for your training in sweat, money, tears, and sometimes blood. Why are you giving it away?\u201d I was horrified. I said, \u201cKnowledge should be free!\u201d It\u2019s based on the way I was reared. He just shook his head and walked away. But it spoke to me.<\/p>\n

Number Two<\/strong> was a taciturn law student, really mature for his age, quiet, observant, discerning. Unapproachable. Nobody and nothing amused him. Except me. Suffice it to say, I was the teacher\u2019s pet. I wasn\u2019t very good, but I was funny. But then, as I do, I crossed a line and then I wasn\u2019t funny anymore.<\/p>\n

These two guys hated each other. I could never figure that out, but I was 18 and stupid. Number One owned the place. Number Two was a subordinate teacher fifteen years younger. There was no question who was the alpha.<\/p>\n

Number One was making me crazy, but I didn\u2019t realize it because I was 18 and stupid. I thought something was wrong with me. My time in martial arts faded, but I never let it go.<\/p>\n

Anyway, these two guys ended up battling it out in a courtroom some years later. It\u2019s a tale straight out of a lawyer novel (no, I didn\u2019t write it, hint at it, or use it for the basis of anything). It involved knowledge. Who had a monetary right to it and who didn\u2019t, which is where the \u201cYou paid for your training in sweat, money, tears, and sometimes blood. Why are you giving it away?\u201d comes in.<\/p>\n

Some years later, I was still carrying Number One\u2019s crazymaking and Number Two\u2019s disapproval\u2014heavily\u2014and I worked up the courage to call Number Three, somebody I didn\u2019t know, but who could maybe let me vent and then talk me down out of the trees. It was a huge<\/em> gamble. It paid off. And I got back in for a while, but first, training was logistically impossible by that time; second, I didn\u2019t have the fire in my belly and I never did. So I let it go.<\/p>\n

Almost thirty years later, I\u2019m hanging with my Tax Deductions in the storage room of my house pitching and tossing. It\u2019s past bedtime for a school night, but they\u2019ve both got messed-up Circadian rhythms and I\u2019m a night owl. My 12-year-old XX TD is tossing out sly innuendos at me, making me aware she knows what she\u2019s saying, and, like the bad mother I am, instead of chastising her, I\u2019m snickering along with her. XY is reading and offering his opinions on everything, as per usual. Dude is in his office busy supporting us like the awesome Dude he is.<\/p>\n

I open the box (my dad\u2019s wooden Scout ditty box, which is far older than I am) with my belts, nunchakus, bag gloves, and jump rope. It\u2019s musty in there. \u201cEeww.\u201d I pick up a belt, sniff it, and tell XX, \u201cThose go.\u201d<\/p>\n

She protests.<\/p>\n

I start singing \u201cLet it Go\u201d just to annoy her and it works. Natch.<\/p>\n

And we go on pitching and tossing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I threw out karate belts I earned between the ages of 18 and 20. They were musty. Hidden away, like all the stuff I haven\u2019t found places to display yet. I like space. I value space. Open, empty space and shelves that say, \u201cWe don\u2019t need to be filled to feel important.\u201d What they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[367,317],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-philosophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6696"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6696"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22587,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6696\/revisions\/22587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moriahjovan.com\/talesofdunham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}