Blakwidow (eBook)

'And in this corner at 275 pounds, Killer Kowalski,' theannouncer intoned and before he could finish 'Kowalski' thepeople were hurling boo's and whistles at the huge, ratherimpassive-looking man leaning against the ropes near thecorner. He absolutely towered over his opponent, whosename I don't remember. He was just another bland babyfacewho was a foil for Killer's wrestling antics. 'That goddamn Kowalski,' my grandfather said, gesturing at the television. 'He was a right bastard but what a wrestler!' My granddad had a huge collection of old black-and-white wrestling matches that he had transferred from tape onto VHS. He also had a lot of newer material that he recorded directly off the television. My wrestling training really began at my grandfather's knee. I would sit at his feet and huddle up against the air conditioner while we watched his tapes and he did his own color commentary. Granddad was very enthusiastic about wrestling and he made staying indoors on those blistering Roseville summer days a lot of fun. The only problem was that he had seen most of the matches about a thousand times and he would often get excited and start telling me about things that were going to happen five minutes down the road. Before my grandfather, •wrestling wasn't something that really entered into my consciousness. Like most girls I was caught up with Barbie and my Easy Bake oven. But I soon came to appreciate the likes of Pat Patterson, Buddy Rodgers, Andre the Giant, Ivan Putski, Special Delivery Jones, Gorgeous George, and a host of others. One of the first things that I noticed was that the 'bad guys' were the most interesting and certainly the most colorful. My grandfather, despite calling them all 'right bastards,' seemed to agree. It wasn't long before I had caught his enthusiasm and knew what was going to happen five minutes in the future of any given match as well. When he and I watched wrestling, everyone else knew the best thing was to leave us alone. 'Are there women wrestlers too, Grampy?' I asked one day. 'Oh sure, the ladies wrestle, and some of them are rightbastards!' he said laughing. 'Really? How come you don't have any women wrestlerson tape?' 'That's a good question, Alex. We'll have to do something about that!' I don't know where he got it and I didn't think to ask but I was soon treated to the likes of Moolah, June Byers, and Vivian Vachon, who was my favorite and definitely a 'right bastard.' I soon proclaimed that I too wanted to become a girl wrestler and styled myself as Amanda Vachon. My grandfather encouraged me, though in retrospect I think that he was just going along with something that he thought would pan out to be a child's short-lived fantasy. My parents, on the other hand, flipped. They absolutely forbade me to watch any more professional wrestling. At first I was devastated, but within a month I went back to my Barbie and Easy Bake oven and all was right with the world again. But despite my parents' best efforts, wrestling never went away entirely. My grandfather secretly dubbed me tapes of matches and we still talked about wrestling when we got the chance. And as I got a bit older and my parents weren't in a position to monitor my television habits, I started watching wwf Superstars and other such fare. Unfortunately, the world at the time didn't really support the idea of women in contact sports. Like most people, I got caught up in the day-to-day grind of living, and wrestling soon became a pipe dream and a 'what if.' Instead my interests in athletics were channeled towards softball and field hockey, and away from wrestling.