Highlights of my Day... Saturday, February 23

1. Q picked me up in the morning and together we made our way to Buk Il High School where my fight was to be held. The place was freezing cold and relatively empty. Slowly but surely, the place started to fill up. Two of my former coworkers from Eumbong Middle School had come out to cheer me on and so that was pretty cool. They seemed to be overly fascinated with how much weight I had lost... I lost about 11 pounds for this fight.

2. As Junior Mint wrapped the heck out of my hands, more and more people approached me to give me their cheers, words of encouragement, and smiles. Some people who had see my pro test, back in October, had come to watch me today. My usual sparring partner from my club had come to watch me and so that was really great to have her there. She really focused on helping me... putting the Vaseline on my face, getting me water, massaging my shoulders. She was really awesome.

3. For the rest of the day, a particular journalist followed me around, asking me a million and one questions and asking my friends questions about me. He even asked me to sign his report pad and so that was pretty cool.

4. They had flip-flopped the fight schedule all around and so I ended up fighting after Black Skinny. We all had made bets as to what round he'd knock his opponent out. I bet on round 4 but he did it in round 3... awesome.

5. Then they called my name. I eagerly approached the ring. I could hear my friends, team mates, and others calling out my name... and it felt so amazing. Losing my fight however, that was devastating... completely devastating. In the third round there was a second when my whole body went numb and everything seemed to go into slow-mo. I could feel my feet slipping from underneath me so I struggled to snap out of it. After the round finished, I sat down in my corner, placed my hands on Junior Mint's shoulders and told him repeatedly that I was sorry. He told me it was ok, I was strong, and then he wiped my legs and face... the bell rang. It was now round four.

6. I had promised myself that I wouldn't cry in front of my team mates or coach and so when they announced that Mi Ran was the winner, I put on my best poker smile, I hugged her and then left the ring, eagerly looking for a corner to hide in. As I walked out of the gymnasium though, my friend Ginny ran up to me and hugged me. She told me that she was so proud and that she loved me... I thought my heart was going to burst. I continued out of the gymnasium but Ki Dong and Jae Min followed me. I choked on my words and fought the tears but eventually the tears came down.

7. The journalist from earlier on in the day had searched me out and had a million and one more questions to ask me. Ki Dong was sweet enough to act as a kind of translator and so we ended up getting into quite the discussion. I was interested in his question, "Do you think the refs were fair?", and actually that was one of my concerns going into this fight. I was nervous that they'd be bias cause my opponent was one of their own, Korean. But I felt they were fair. She was better than me. I knew I was way stronger than her but she was a lot faster and had been training for 2 years with the same coach. I've only been with Junior Mint now for less than half a year. Regardless, she won fair and square... and that flat out sucked.

8. Waiting for our boxing club members to finish the clean-up after felt like years. My team mates wanted me to join them for dinner but I wanted nothing more than to curl up on my bathroom floor with the hot, hot shower water beating down hard on my skin. Both Black Skinny and Panty Boy Jr. had won their fights and honestly, I really didn't feel like I belonged at the dinner party... it was their dinner party. They'd be all happy and rosy cheeked while I'd be sitting there basking in my loss. I had heard enough "It's ok, Amy" for the night... it wasn't ok and nothing anyone could say and no amount of money could change that. I wanted to go home and so, on that note, I skipped out on collecting my fight money and got Q to drive me home.

9. The next couple of hours were spent replaying the fight in my head, crying, and starring at my morphing face in the mirror. I felt like I had just turned into Shrek. Just a couple hours earlier I had been the center of many people as they curiously took my photo.... kids, teenagers, sponsors... people I didn't even know. They flattered me with their "You're too pretty to be a boxer" comments but now... ouch... now, if only they could see me. Standing there in my bathroom, the face starring back at me didn't look like mine. Within a matter of a couple of hours, my face morphed into that of definitely a boxers. Black left eye, swollen right jaw, and a bruised nose. I spooked myself out though when I wiped away my bangs and there, underneath my hair, was a pack of what appeared to be popped blood cells. A small pool of blood that sat under a couple layers of thin skin. The positive side of this all being though that Mi Ran's body shots didn't do a thing, which is good for me, of course. I remember once, Hye Min gave me a brutal body shot to the liver... I wasn't able to laugh for days and it really effected my digestion.

10. Q to the rescue. Once again I fell for Q's "I just want to see you for ONE second" line and so I agreed to go outside to talk to him. By then my face had totally changed from bad to worse and I'm sure he was shocked. He tried to act cool though, and even joked about it, telling me that I looked like a Korean school girl with my fat cheek. For the rest of the evening my swollen jaw was the center of our jokes. He'd tell me that he loved my new cheek injections, I'd laugh and then I'd give a big frown... my face hurt.

QUESTION OF THE DAY...
What now?

QUOTE OF THE DAY...
The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not our circumstances.
-- Martha Washington