the beautiful, confident, and extremely strong kris statlander, who is (in kayfabe) an alien. goals.
wrestling is, in part, defined by its interactions with the audience. a wrestler intending to be a good guy (a “face”, in wrestling parlance) might be forced to switch his character and alignment to evil (a “heel”) if the audience isn’t behind him for whatever reason. a wrestler must interact with the audience in order to best represent the morality play that is professional wrestling. professional wrestling is somehow more intimate, more “real” than the real sports it plays at being, yet more visceral and cathartic (at least, in my opinion) than the theatre it really is. if you leave a wrestling show and your throat isn’t hoarse from screaming at the heels and screaming for the faces, then either you or the wrestlers have not done their jobs.
in all honesty, this confidence and magnetism is probably the part i struggle with most when it comes to wrestling. i was never that athletic—i swam and biked in middle school but mostly stopped in high school and college—and i’m weirdly uncoordinated. you can always tell if i’m coming or going because i walk heavy. i skip the record player and i rattle chatchkis and glassware. i’ve met guys in wrestling that are 250lb plus who walk with infinitely more grace than i could ever hope for. i carry myself really confident outside of wrestling and i thought that i would be able to stay in character really easily, even if that character was only “me, but a wrestler”. alas! not so.
it’s been difficult to realize that all the confidence i’d prided myself on gaining in the eight years since i graduated high school (which was a horrible time for me and almost every other interesting person) doesn’t necessarily translate to trying something new, that’s physically and emotionally demanding, very focused on how my body looks at what it does, and where making a mistake could mean not only embarrassment but serious injury for myself, or worse, someone i’m supposed to protect. it’s all worth it though, for the “pop”.
the pop is the verbal elation that the crowd expresses when they see something they like—a cool move or series thereof, a significant advancement in the storyline, the return of someone they care deeply about. of course, i haven’t experienced this first-hand yet, because i’m still training, yet i do get incredible encouragement from the people i train with, and better yet, myself. when i take a big scary move for the first time, get flung to the ring from great heights and lie on the mat, i’m thinking:
1.) oh fuck
2.) oh fuck, i didn’t die
3.) oh fuck, i DID IT!
this, my friends, is the fine art of the “self-pop”, which i am still only a student in.
this is a powerbomb, one of those moves which is terrifying to take for the first time but leads to great elation once you realize you didn’t die and probably won’t die the next time either!
sometimes i’ll be in the ring for a half hour just trying to get that one thing right. and sometimes i have to come in the next day, hurting from the day before, and do it again. and again. and again, pounding the knowledge into my body until it works right. the longer you struggle, the louder the pop. the louder the “self-pop”.
i am so goddamn lucky to train where i do, among such kind and encouraging people who want to see each other succeed. my coach never lets the frustration beat me, even when i’m beating myself up, feeling like i’m wasting everyone’s time or being a coward. quote coach covey: “it takes as long as it takes”. and it does. and it will. but it all comes eventually. and so does the pop.
ciao for nao
the powerbomb princess 💋💪