History Repeats

When I was a sophomore in high school I joined the wrestling team.  I no longer recall what appealed to me, exactly.  I was already on the football and track teams which filled my fall and spring, respectively, so maybe I was looking for something to do during the winter. 

I do remember my first day of practice.  It was the Monday before Thanksgiving, and as a football player, I had been unavailable for practice before that day.  There is a hierarchy of sports, after all, and Texas proves the rule with no exceptions.  We only had one official wrestling coach, but we had three assistant volunteers, at least of two of whom were of blood relation to one of the team.

I was an hour late due to the required off-season football weight training (again, hierarchy).  Stepping into the windowless, fluorescent-lit, white-walled practice room was much like walking into a greenhouse in winter.  The sour air was moistened by the kind of sweat, testosterone, and aggression that only a dozen and a half teenagers could generate. 

Roger was the one of the volunteer coaches.  He stood as high as my chest, was built like a fire hydrant with only slightly more hair, and was immediately assigned to assist me that evening.  I spent the next two hours being forcibly removed from (then rapidly reintroduced to) the effects of gravity.  Walking into Roger was exactly like walking into a turnstile that moved at the speed of a blender.  He seemed to think that simply tripping a man took too long before he hit the ground.  I wasn’t just thrown; I was spiked.  I’ve been in gentler car wrecks.

Fathom my surprise, then, when I was told I’d be representing the team as a heavyweight against two schools the following evening . . . on varsity.  We had a JV team, but no.  Apparently it was the consensus that my human rag doll impression would be best witnessed by the maximum possible audience.

Tuesday night provided maximum embarrassment opportunity.  A wrestling singlet is called a leotard in any other context, and I couldn’t bring myself to put mine on until I saw someone else wearing one first.  The headgear looks like a jock strap with a protective cup both in front and in back, so having my ears covered by one made me feel like I was the victim of a locker room prank.

They didn’t have the slim-fitting wrestling shoes in my size because of course they didn’t, so I was required to wear my own comparatively bulky Nike Pump knock-offs.  For all the times I was asked where my actual shoes were, I may as well have been wearing the box they came in.  The referee wouldn’t even let me onto the mat until the coach apologized and explained on my behalf.

Finally came my first match.  I was pinned in 47 seconds, which was actually better than I had been expecting.

I reminded myself that I was new at this and got ready for my second match.  Mostly this involved sitting in a metal folding chair at the end of a row of my teammates, studying the space between my feet, and being very still in the hopes that no one would look at me. 

Time again for me to take the mat, and I screwed up my determination as best I could.  I knew I couldn’t win, but I didn’t want to lose as badly as I had the first time.  I never found out exactly how, but I was somehow flipped and folded, not at the waist, but rather at some point between my navel and the bottom of my rib cage.  I quit moving as soon as I couldn’t breathe.  Never before or since have I had such a close-up view of my own balls.

It took 41 seconds.

People win awards and recognition and say they’re humbled by it.  That’s not being humbled, folks, that’s being honored.  You want to feel humbled, see what it’s like to fail to stop someone twisting you up until the only thing you can smell is your own undercarriage.  Try it with a gymnasium full of people watching.  Try it with someone keeping an official record.

My opponent released me, and I stayed on my back for a moment to reinflate.  The referee eyed me with a mix of sympathy and humor and held his hand out to help me back to my feet.  Once I was up he leaned to a distance were only I could hear him, and said, “First day, huh?”  Perhaps he thought it would make me feel better.  I didn’t sense any malice.  Only pity.

I remember stepping outside under the guise of cooling off, which of course didn’t take long since I hadn’t broken a sweat.  There, amidst a quantity of pavement only a public school could provide, I sat and tried to figure out why anyone thought this would be a good idea.

At some point I realized how wrestling operates as a team sport.  At a wrestling meet, each team provides an opponent for each of fourteen weight classes ranging from 103 pounds to “heavy”.  Points are scored during each match for various moves: takedown, reversal, escape.  After three two-minute rounds, the point spread determines the number of points awarded to the team to a maximum of five.  If a wrestler pins his opponent, the match is over and his team gets six points.  If a team has no wrestler for a given weight class, it’s a forfeit, and the opposing team gets six points.

My team had no heavyweight before I joined.  Getting pinned, i.e. losing as badly as one could possibly lose, was the exact same consequence as my absence.  I was benefiting the team just by putting on the outfit and standing in the circle against no one at all.

I was placed on varsity to be filler.  A punching bag with my picture on it couldn’t have done any worse.  The only one with anything to lose was me.

Fast forward twenty years, and I’m graduating with a Master’s in Fine Arts from an Acting program rated one of the best 25 in the world.  I’m represented by a reputable and respected talent agency with no interest in the voice-over experience I’d had before I moved to Chicago.  This is true for two years.

A month ago, this began to change.  They called me in for one VO audition, and the next week they called me in for another.  Then another the following week, and two the week after.  By wondrous coincidence this began just a after I began a voice-over class for the purposes of brushing up my skills and doing a bit of networking.  When I thanked them for bringing me in lately, I was told they had decided to try me out because they had no one who fit my “sound profile.” 

Filler.  Nothing to lose. 

I gave my heart to the wrestling team for the rest of the season.  The coaches taught me a few techniques.  At the start of practice someone might show me a new move, and tell me I had to do it 100 times before I could go home (wax on, wax off).  I trained, I drilled, and slowly I began to conquer.  Every Tuesday there was another meet, and every Saturday another tournament.  Sometimes I’d get pinned, and sometimes I had the least points at the end of 3 rounds.  Sometimes I’d win.  I never placed higher than 3^rd in a given tournament, but I earned half a dozen medals.  Nearly every week my parents would receive a Pride-O-Gram from my assistant principal with a clipping from the local newspaper when Head Coach Johnson singled me out in interviews about the team.  

I competed in the state championship, and got as far as the 2^nd Consolation round – two rounds away from finals. I finished the season with a win-loss record of 21-21.  Of my 21 wins, two were forfeits in my favor, one was by points . . . and the other 18 were by pin. 

At the end-of-season banquet, my teammates made awards for everyone, and I got the only one that wasn’t a tongue-in-cheek joke: Best Attitude Award.  Coach Johnson gave me the trophy for Most Improved Wrestler and gave me significant attention during his speech about the season.

I never wrestled again.

Now I’m an artist, a performer, and I’m trying my damnedest to make a living.  Sometimes people bring me in because I’m the best, and sometimes people are taking a chance on me, and sometimes people bring me in because they have nothing to lose.

All I have to do to eventually succeed is remember and employ the lesson I already learned.  Train, drill, persist, develop new skills, and with time, no one will ever again make me smell my own balls.

Not without consent, anyway.