Mike Willden
tt28, music festival director
tServed Raleigh, N.C., mission, 1998-2000
Did you ever bend the rules?
tIn the summer of 1999, I was dying to see Star Wars: Episode I. I just could not possibly wait a whole year. Neither could my companion. So we talked this 17-year-old kid into sluffing his karate lessons, which were taught by his kick-ass mom, and coming with us. Afterwards, we get a call with a challenge, the karate-class-teaching-killer-black-belt mom wants to give my companion and me a karate lesson. After each of us was thrown around like a beanbag for an hour, we kindly knelt and thanked her for her time. She then whispered, “If you ever have my son miss one of my classes to help you break another of your rules, your face will resemble that Darth Maul guy’s mug'black and red'except it won’t be paint.” I was a straight arrow with the rules after that.
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