The Master's Hand

The Master’s Hand

Reflections on mentor, and former teacher, Master Lorenzo Gibson

A reunion I won’t forget.

I stood in the do jang office and nervously waited for further instruction from the teacher. Korean martial arts is a very different skill set from other forms, and I was about to try and prove that my Korean heritage made me a natural. Just then Lorenzo Gibson, a highly decorated fourth degree Tae Kwon Do black belt, asked me to perform a side kick and front punch. I hesitated, since I didn’t really know what either one looked like, and eventually managed a literal kick to my right side and a punch in front of me. Lorenzo looked interested in my potential, but I didn’t think I was ready, and decided to hold off joining Mr. Gibson’s school for a few more months.

It was the summer of 1988, and I was only six years old when I first met Master Lorenzo Gibson. The man was lean and fast as lighting, yet could strike with accuracy of a sniper, and the force of a wrecking ball. Master Gibson ran a very successful South Richmond based Tae Kwon Do school in the peak of the karate craze. The movie, The Karate Kid had come out a few years earlier, and Jean Claude Van Dam was just hitting the big screen. Bruce Lee was already a legend, but others like Jackie Chan and Jet Li had yet to be introduced to the American mainstream. Whatever my intentions, I was hooked, and on my 7th birthday I began my first class at Lorenzo’s martial arts studio.

The years went by fast! I was a quick learner, and naturally athletic for my age. When I was learning martial arts there were really no such things as children’s classes, and I often competed against adults and bigger kids. I practiced several times a week for 90 minutes, worked on my forms, Korean language, sparring, and board breaking. My belt seemed like it went from white to yellow, and soon to red in a fairly short period of time. By the time I was nine years old I was an experienced fighter, and had learned some of the key principals that I would cling to for the remainder of my life. Have respect, integrity, honesty, dedication and humility. Master Gibson never failed to remind us that regardless of what color belt we have, and in all aspects of life, not just martial arts, these teachings can be applied.

On April 19, 1991, two months shy of my 10th birthday, I passed a rigorous examination to become the youngest black belt in the state of Virginia. Several months after that I left Master Gibson’s school forever in order to pursue my growing passion for another sport I was gifted in, baseball. That was the last time I saw Master Lorenzo Gibson. Aside from my parents, and a select few teachers, Lorenzo Gibson’s teachings were an integral part of my childhood and development. I have had many varsity coaches, and “scholarly” professors who lacked the pure passion for people and sharing his gift. Lorenzo wanted YOU to become a better person. In the decade that followed I would rebel against many of the values that I held so dear, as only a child would, and although those teachings were never forgotten, they were indeed dormant into my teen years.


I never did forget about Master Gibson, or the many other students I learned with under his guidance. Over the years I stopped by our old school location only to find that it was no longer there. I figured Lorenzo had gone his own way and probably started his own school, or maybe moved. In 2006, I re-attempted to locate my old teacher and found his new location, yet failed to actually see him when I stopped by.

Only July 16th, 2010 I sat as a spectator in one of Master Lorenzo’s classes. I was thrilled to see him doing what I have always known him to do, and honestly just happy to see my old friend. Watching him work with his new students brought back a rush of childhood memories, whether it was him showing me how to break a board, or shift my body to a correct stance. The students, like before, showed the utmost respect, saying “yes sir”, and bowing at the appropriate times. Then the class ended, Master Lorenzo saw me and walked over with a very puzzled look on his face. He asked “Do I Know you?. I replied “Indeed you do, it’s been 20 years!” Without a second thought he says “Mike!” Twenty years later I have long hair, am a foot taller, and not to mention Lorenzo has taught thousands of students…and yet, he remembered my name.

For the next 20 minutes he introduces to all his students, like I was some celebrity, and we try to catch up on 20 years of life. Master Lorenzo is 56 now, but time has been kind to him. He is still a physical specimen and just as fast as he was before, though he says he limits the really tough tricks. His daughter, who I met just after she was born, is a 20 year old VCU student, and his son who wasn’t born yet is now 18. Perhaps the greatest thing I wanted to tell Lorenzo was that I had never forgotten what he taught me as a seven year old child. I told him I run long distance ultra marathons now, but I still apply the things he taught me during, and outside of races. He said hearing that from me meant a great deal to him, and confirmed that all his work over the years did matter, and still matters today. Neither one of us could stop smiling, and we could have talked for hours, maybe days, but he had places to be and our time was up. Master Lorenzo was the last person in the do jang when I left that day. As any respectful student would do for their teacher, I turned back towards my mentor, put my feet together, and bowed.

We will be in touch soon.

20 Summers

Maybe it's because I am getting older, but I have spent a lot of time recently thinking about...well, time. I'm thinking about how time slows and speeds up at seemingly irrelevant paces, of which I control neither. I watch moveis about time travel and realize humanity is so very caught up in the concept of time conservation, alteration, and relativity. However, even Einstein himself declared that time is a mode of existence, not a condition of it. In other words time is a man made measurement of physical change, and the repetitive cycles of that change that by and large are quantifiable and predictable. Time is like weight, length, and volume. Measurable, yet consistent methods of elements we desire out of pure necessity to place an exact value.

20 summers ago I was nine years old. On my ninth birthday, my birthday always falling on the first day of summer, I attended a Richmond Braves baseball game with a dozen on my closest little buddies. A severe thunderstorm rolled in, and we opted to head back to my parents to watch the widely coveted motion picture Rocky 5.

The summer of 1990 was all about ring pops, skip it, sharks and minnows, and sleepovers. This was years before bills required long work weeks, health required dental and vision plans, cancer had yet to ravage my family, and all my grandparents were still alive for me to hug and listen to their heartbeat. I hadn’t a care in the world, aside from how to tell Rainey Lacey, my 4th grade crush, how pretty I thought she was. There was no Eminem, but there was Vanilla Ice. There was “Pants on the ground”, but there were Hammer pants. There was no AIM, iPhones, Facebook, MySpace, Wii, or generally even an interactive “web” of computerized networks. We did, however, indulge in Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Oregon Trail, and Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?

The summer of 1990 saw a change in the world, and a change in the way I viewed the world. From age 8 to 9 the Berlin wall fell, Russia held its first free election since 1917, and George Bush took over as president. The same year Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi armies invaded Kuwait, and America officially took part in the Gulf War, also known as Operation Desert Storm.

The summer of 1990 would undoubtedly usher in a decade of generation x, the children of the baby boomers rise to prominence, and change in the nature of social revelations. One could say the world was on the cusp of a great technological era, and the good old days of your grandparent’s WWII world of black and white gone for good. But, I have many fond memories of my summer in 1990, perhaps more memories than someone my age should have of that year. A guy named Michael Jordan, especially his shoes, were making all of us kids want to be like Mike. Unfortunately for Mr. Jordan, I had already fallen in love with my red and white size 7 Reebok Pumps.

Many of you weren’t even born yet, just as I was not alive to witness the triumph and tragedy of my parent’s generation. To my friends reading this who are under the age of 20: In the summer of 1990 Mike Bailey conquered his fear of the high dive, started his second season of Little League baseball, hadn’t hit puberty, earned his black belt, and grew two inches to a towering height of 4 foot 7. Who knew that 20 summers later I would be typing this to friends who won’t be born for another 3-4 years? Who knew that 20 summers later I would “tag” friends in this note who I won’t meet until ten years later in college, in Denver 13 year later, or on some tropical island 17 years after.

In the summer of 1990 I hadn’t even lived one third of the life I have lived up until now. 20 summers ago the twin towers still graced the New York skyline and September 11th was simply the second week of classes, 64 count crayon boxes, and number 2 pencils. My grandparents would stay up late and talk with me on the porch, and if I was lucky I watch Johnny Carson with them.

If I step outside on a warm evening like tonight and take a deep breath, 20 summers ago might as well be this very moment of collective thought. What is 20 years really? What is it to age, and grow up? 20 summers ago where were you?

-Mike Bailey