EXCERPTS FROM THE LIFE OF A WRESTLING NERD: #1

DISCLAIMER: The following events are all entirely true. Don't pity me. This is the life I chose.

I have loved pro wrestling unconditionally ever since I was old enough to elbow drop my pillow. From a young boy watching on Saturday mornings (when my mom would tell me to not like Jake Roberts because he pulled Miss Elizabeth's hair) to a young teenager watching on Monday nights (when my mom wouldn't let me hang a Stone Cold Steve Austin poster up in my room because he was giving the finger on both hands, but I hung it on the INSIDE OF MY CLOSET DOOR anyway, so suck it mom (wait, no!)), I was a massive fan.

So much so, that me and my cousin Brian would wrestle each other and film it, making our own wrestling show (much like most kids in the nineties with access to a video camera). We'd take out (and effectively ruin, over the years) my Uncle's pullout couch mattress, put some pillows under it, and BAM - there was our ring.

I'd usually be the Undertaker or The Rock, while Bri would be Shawn Michaels or Stone Cold (we'd do undercard matches too as jobbers, we wanted everyone to get paid). We'd do entrances (because the only music I owned at this age was WWF Full Metal and subsequent WWF Theme Music CDs. Somehow I grew up to be a musician) complete with someone flicking the lights and announcing and holding the camera.

I have no idea how we never got hurt. We'd jump off the arm of the couch onto each other and end up fine. I was so clumsy in regular life (cracking my head open at every turn) so you'd suspect I'd have at least a few blown quads from play wrestling, but nope.

Anyway, this IS going somewhere.

In seventh grade we had to do a project where we had to make our own movie. Somehow I ended up in the group with the popular girls (maybe it was because I could borrow my cousin's camera).

We filmed all day and went back to one of the girls' houses to watch what we'd done.

You can probably see where this is going.

I hooked up the A/V cables to the TV, rewound the tape, and pressed play. Regret washed over my body like Triple H's backwash over the front row.

What appeared on the screen, obviously, was not what we had just filmed.

Instead, it was me, doing the Undertaker's signature "turn the lights on with my voodoo" pose, with my eyes rolled back in my head, and my cousin Bri announcing my epic entrance to the crowd (living room).

I fumbled for what felt like hours trying to fast-forward to our movie, but the shrieks of laughter disarmed me like a kick to the gut does to any of Stone Cold's opponents. Images of me rolling around with my cousin and his friend from school, powerbombing them onto a bare mattress flashed across the screen. I was sweating like Hogan in a rest hold.

They demanded to see more. And I was already so flustered that I'm pretty sure I ended up showing them more. They weren't impressed by my ring psychology.

I have no real memory of how I ended up getting out of that excruciatingly embarrassing scenario, if I talked my way out of it with my suave James Bond charm (...), or fled the house crying, but I have a guess.

But I do remember we got the highest mark in the class for the movie, and my teacher gave us ***1/4 stars on our match.

This is just one of many moments that made me into the wrestling nerd I am today. Until next time, this has been Excerpts From the Life of a Wrestling Nerd.