This friend of mine has been very consciously raising her young daughter outside of stereotypical gender norms. They’ve done quite a number on my friend, and she’s like, “Nope, my kid’s life will be different.”
Her daughter is small for her age, and will probably remain small. This has affected her self-confidence. Earlier this year, my friend decided to tell her daughter a slightly sanitized version of Arya Stark’s journey in GoT, to basically demonstrate how a small girl could learn to be badass.
Six months go by, and the daughter turns from 5 to 6. Her mom asks her what she wants for her birthday. The daughter says, “I want to learn how to fight.” So my friend, who has zero martial arts experience, looks up a place, and they go there.
The moment they get there, my friend is thinking, “This may not be the right place.” It’s a Krav Maga/MMA gym. Lots of burly dudes beating the crap out of each other, basically. Not your kid-friendly karate dojo.
But she doesn’t want to tell her daughter that they have to leave because the place is filled with intimidating men – it would pretty much fly in the face of everything she’s trying to teach her. So she says, “Okay. I don’t know if they have a kid’s class here. Why don’t you go ask who the teacher is, and then ask them?”
So her daughter walks up to one dude, asks for the teacher, then gets pointed to this tattooed, musclebound dude with his head shaved and a goatee. As my friend put, “The guy looked like your bigger, meaner younger brother.”
She trails behind her kid a bit, ready to step in, and listens in. Her daughter walks up the guy and says, “Hi! Do you have classes for kids? I want to learn how to fight.”
The guy looks down at this wee little girl, and he says, “Uh, well, no, we don’t really. Maybe I can talk to your mom and suggest some places for you? This isn’t really a place for little girls.”
Her daughter reaches into her jacket pocket, pulls out a nickel, holds it out to the guy and says, “Valar morghulis.”
The guy takes the nickel, looks at it, then says, totally deadpan: “Valar dohaeris. Of course I can teach you.”
The mom comes over and says, “I thought you said you didn’t have kid’s classes?” The guy says, “We do now. Come into the office and we’ll work up a training schedule.” The mom: “Do you have any idea how much it’ll cost?” The guy holds up the nickel. “She’s already paid up.”
A great story about a little girl who wants to learn how to fight.
Check it out……
Train and fight!
WarriorMale
Krav Maga huh… whoever messes with this little girl will go back home screaming and bleeding.
not finishing 100% of your personal projects or commitments is totally normal! please don’t let it discourage you from pursuing new ones! there are a dozen projects over the years I’ve committed to and almost immediately abandoned. i get embarrassed sometimes when I remember specific ones, but eventually you got to say fork it and move on
literally no creator, however successful or prolific or famous, has completed all or even a majority of the works they conceived. they all have notebooks of dozens, hundreds of ideas and concepts 90% of which will never see the light of day. and that’s okay!
the projects we don’t finish give us practice. and more practice leads to more and higher quality finished products. The act of creating is never a waste of time.
“‘No’?” echoed the space emperor. “‘No’?! No one. Ever. Tells me. ‘No’.”
He advanced, close enough that the threads on his rich robes could be counted by the naked eye. After a furtive glance over his shoulder, he dropped his voice to a desperate whisper and said, “Could you… could you do it again? Please?”
“No.”
The space emperor’s eyes shone like embers as he leaned forward, clasping his hands in front of his face. “So this… this ‘democracy’ you speak of. You’re telling me that people might… disobey me? They wouldn’t have to do everything I tell them to?”
“Not if they disagree with you.”
“They can do that?!” He licked his lips, trembling with excitement. “And voting! You say I… you say I could lose?!”
“Yeah, uh. And you probably would.”
“Incredible,” he breathed. “Why, I could kiss you!” With a surprised laugh, he stopped himself mid-step. “But—you wouldn’t like that! Right? You’d have an ‘opinion’? Gosh… do you think other people have those?!”
The space emperor let out a long, melancholy sigh and turned to the hero, his lip trembling with delicate misery. “I’m going to miss you,” he sniffed. “I don’t think I’ll watch, you know, when they… when they do it.” The tear that had been clinging valiantly to his eyelashes finally broke free and rolled down his cheek. “Oh!” he cried, and threw his arms around the hero’s neck with a great, shuddering sob. “Yours will be the only skull I drink from ever again—I promise! I will think of you every time, and I’ll pretend you’re still here with me!”
“Or you could just… not have me executed.”
The space emperor inhaled sharply and took a step back, his face red and puffy from crying. “That’s an option?!”
The serving-woman stood with her back ramrod straight and her eyes fixed firmly on the floor. Every muscle in her body looked tense, and only the rapid rise and fall of her shoulders betrayed her terror.
“You’ve ruined my gown,” said the space emperor, regarding the growing purple stain on his sleeve. “These fibers were harvested on Lutoya-29, a planet that was demolished six units ago. There is no other like it in the galaxy. I could have you harvested for washing-water for this.” He looked up and met the hero’s eyes, his thoughtful expression melting into a delighted grin. “But I don’t have to, do I?”
“No, Your Incandecense,” whispered the woman. Her sweat-beaded skin had grown translucent with fear.
“I don’t even have to have you killed at all!” he exclaimed. “I could… I could…” he cast around the chamber, as though searching for inspiration in the lavish furnishings.
“Please, Your Incandecense.” The woman’s voice was low and unsteady, but her gaze remained fixed on the floor. “I’ll do anything, please, forgive—”
“Anything! You’re right!” He clapped his hands and rubbed them together, stamping his feet in a little dance. “I could do anything! In fact—” he reached over the table and clasped the hero’s hand in his own. “Nothing is anything! I could do nothing! Nothing at all!” He giggled merrily and then froze, gingerly releasing the hero’s hand and leaning back. He tapped one bejeweled finger against his temple and gave an exaggerated wink. “Oh, right. Consent.”
The serving-woman’s eyes flickered to the hero’s for a moment, nervous questions burning in them. The hero gave a barely-imperceptible shrug and a very tiny, reassuring smile. The emperor did not seem to notice.
“Is there more wine?” he asked. “Splendid. Please. Do it again.”
“What…?” The woman’s skin flashed an alarming yellow.
The emperor gestured enthusiastically between himself and the crystal pitcher. “The wine. My gown. I think you should reacquaint them.”
“He wants you to spill the wine on him again,” explained the hero. “No, really. He’s, uh… he’s having an interesting day.”
“I am learning so many things,” said the emperor. “Did you know that you have feelings, too? It’s not just me! My new friend has feelings, that man over there has feelings, that… whatever that thing is has feelings!” He stood up and threw his arms wide in a sudden, emphatic motion, flinging droplets of purple liquid from his soiled sleeve. “Maybe everyone has feelings! Maybe robots! Maybe my enemies! Maybe—” he stopped, and the delirious grin vanished from his face. “Maybe the Lutoyans have feelings…” His voice dropped to a whisper, and he stared at the hero with a strange expression. “But… there aren’t any more Lutoyans…”
The space emperor took his breakfast in bed, bathed in sweet oils, allowed his hair to be combed and coiffed and his face painted with rare minerals, and then sighed in delicate frustration.
“None of this seems right,” he confessed to his wardrober, after rejecting the seventh gown he was presented with. It was deep blue silk, studded all over with crystals that glinted and sparkled like a night sky. “It’s just not working for me today.”
“That is one of the finest gowns in the galaxy, Your Incandescence,” said the wardrober. “It is an accurate starmap of the constellations as seen from your boyhood home, rivaled in beauty and quality only by your other raiments. But perhaps this is more to your impeccable tastes–” It offered an eighth gown, a trailing cascade of iridescent blue-green fabric layered with shimmering, diaphanous beetle wings. “A species of rare insect went extinct for the construction of this one,” it said. “It was considered sacred to the inhabitants of that world. Wearing this gown declares your might and majesty to the galaxy.”
The space emperor pursed his lips. “Hmm,” he said. “Not that one, I think.” There was an unfamiliar twisting sensation in his gut when he looked at the gown.
“I hope the feast is to your pleasure, Your Incandescence. We did not have much time to prepare before–”
“It is not to my pleasure!” cried the space emperor, lashing out and knocking the platter to the floor. The attendant winced as the tureen shattered and bent to clean it up. “I want to go back!”
“That would be inadvisable,” said the war magnate, rolling her eyes. “It is not yet safe for you to return planetside; there may be traps or other assassins lying in wait. I’m sure your friend is fine.”
The entire palace was climate-controlled, including the military wing, so there was no reason for the space emperor to feel so cold as he walked through the halls. It was just another concern to bring up with his doctor later that evening, along with the pain in his chest and difficulty swallowing around the tightness in his throat. He so rarely fell ill–even as a child, the diseases of the common rabble had never touched him.
The doctor would have to wait. He had more important business to attend to.
He ran his thumb along the special weapon the General had given him. It was simple in design, as unlike the ornate ceremonial laser he always wore at his hip as it was possible to be. He didn’t understand exactly how it functioned, but he didn’t need to; all that mattered was that it worked. The General assured him that it would be a most fitting punishment.
“What?” said the space emperor. “What just… happened?”
The General bowed his head and held out his arm. The space emperor took it numbly and allowed himself to be led from the room, away from the acrid smoke rising from the dead robot. “You must forgive me, Your Incandescence. I will bear the blame for this… unfortunate oversight. Walk with me, if you please, and I will explain.”
The sprawling facility seemed to become oppressively small. The space emperor sucked in an unsteady breath and discovered that oxygen had suddenly stopped working while he was distracted by the screen. “Air,” he wheezed, stumbling toward the turbolift. “I need air.”
Fierce heat rippled across his cheeks and all the way down his spine. The space emperor tore his gaze away from the Lutoyan, gritting his teeth against the unwelcome feeling. He adjusted the circlet furiously until he was sure that his entire head was protected by its energy shield.
“How kind of you to join me,” he forced out, squeezing his eyes shut and trying not to think about the way the muscles in the other man’s arms flexed when he tested his restraints. “I hope you are enjoying our imperial hospitality.” It was not the self-assured and dangerous voice he had planned to use, but something strained and uneven.
“Not really, no. This kind of stuff isn’t my cup of tea,” said the Lutoyan dryly. “Speaking of which… is that a coffee machine?”
“YOU TOLD ME YOU WERE ACQUIRING A JUVENILE!!” wailed Goeduin, clining to a not-high-enough branch of one of the columnar fungi that grew in the space station’s expansive City Park.
“I was,” sulked Human Steve, casually holding the other end of the dubiously thin-looking leash as the ‘Dog’ on the other end stood on her hind legs to sniff at Goeduin. “-But when I went home for the holidays my sister showed me this girl and, well. I just fell in love.”
Clyod thought he might find the situation amusing if his defensive reflexes hadn’t paralyized him to resemble an inedible stone, leaving him down at mouth-and-worse height.
