Thoughts, stories, and ideas from Sensei Steve Gottwirt

Thoughts, stories, and ideas from                  Sensei Steve Gottwirt
Some of these thoughts, stories, and personal history appeared in our newsletter, "Dō Gakuin News". Few members have been with us since our first issue in 1993. As such, ideas on this page may have been printed before, but are worth telling again.

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

'Box of Belts'

This story is from many years ago, but someone asked me about it just the other day: A couple of decades ago a Tae Kwon Do associate was impressed enough, for whatever reason, to ‘join’ me to his international association. I never asked for it, but somehow found myself appointed to his board of directors and was appointed NY State Representative. He was ordering embroidered black belts for some newly promoted yudansha one day and asked if he ever gave me a belt. I said no, and thank you for the thought, but I already have many belts - some were awarded to me, some were bought, and for some reason, several were gifted to me by others. I said that I have a cardboard box filled with belts, and the phrase ‘box of belts’ for some reason stuck. He doubted me, so the next time I saw him I brought in the box of belts. At that time he handed me an embroidered belt which he ordered anyway. Here is a photo of my box of belts, along with obis I currently wear. There may be one or two more belts floating around that I couldn’t locate for this photo.