 | Para Mi Amigo, Eddie Guerrero
Current mood:  contemplative
Category: Goals, Plans, Hopes 
I guess it should come to pass that I mention to you all my reason for going through wrestling boot camp, and what Eddie Guerrero could possibly have anything to do with it. My readers at "The Making Of A Wrestling GOD" already know, but for my new MySpacers, here is the story.
I used to dream about becoming a pro wrestler. You know, back when becoming an Astronaught, Hollywood Actor or Indian Chief each enjoyed equal billing on the list of what I wanted to do when I grew up. But wrestling was always the top spot for me. But it's funny how life has a tendancy of getting in the way of a persons whimsy. (Yes, I know I use whimsy often, I like the word. Say it fast! WHIMSY! WHIMSY!...ahh, go to hell then.) I mean, there ARE pro wrestlers out there. Very few compared to the masses who want to become one. The same can be said for Astronaughts. And any number of popular "whimsical" professions. But, save for the select few that actually make a go of whimsical endeavors, for the rest of us life leads us down a more conventional path. Some meet the person of their dreams. For others maybe the Military calls their name. And still others just decide for some unknown reason they don't have it in them to try what they really want to do and so they take up accounting. Whichever the case, the reason may be as different from one person as it is to the next.
Take me, for example.
Early 1990's I find myself out of high school, being all I could be~ In The Arrrrmmm....mmm...mmmyyyyy. Getting to the next beer bash with my friends and fast cars with faster woman was all I found myself interested in. I enjoyed spectacular success in wasting my time with not applying myself when I should have, ie: dead end jobs, and a lot of them! Let's see, in one summer I found myself in this tortuous schedule: Wake up around noon~30 and take a shower to wash the previous nights noxious ether of beer, cigarette smoke and bad cologne off my body. At two I was at the Harness Horse Racing Track for the first of my jobs of the day, cleaning up the place from the previous nights chaos of betting slips, nacho containers and fountain drink cups. I was out of there at five to grab a bite to eat, change into my uniform of chinos, white button down shirt and bow tie with a "Muskegon Race Track" logo'd vest for my shift as a mutuals cashier at said track. At ten I ran to the car, grabbed the jeans and very tight fitting black "Rush Street" t~shirt and changed in the porta potty so I was ready for my third job of the day/night, being a bouncer at "The Preeminent Nightspot in Muskegon". By the time the place closed down it was about three in the am before I left the place. Home? You may all be thinking that, but oh, how you would be mistaking. There are the obligatory after parties and occasional late night beer bashes at the beach I had to attend, the price of living on the fringe of jet setting! That put me home at around 7:30/8:00 am, and then I would catch a few zzz's before I woke up at noon or so to do it all over again. Oh, and I was fullfilling my reserve military obligation at that time, so once a month I also threw National Guards into the equation as well.
I did this for a long time, and I loved every minute of it. But then Mother died.
I was very close to my Mom. Not a day goes by I don't think of her for at least a second. I used to have these dreams about her, but since I wrote about them in an interview Char (Hi Char!) did with me, I'll spare you those epics. My Mother was an avid bingo fan, and to this day I still carry, in my wallet now because the thingy broke that kept it on my keys, a round little medallion that say's "BORN TO BINGO" on it. It was her good luck charm. She went to work one morning and never came home. They say she had a massive heart attack, and I still feel my own heart ache when I think of her dying on the floor of that hot hell hole she worked in. The place didn't have adaquate ventilation. But I digress.
Her passing put an end to my playboy ways, and I spent the next couple years just existing. I worked for my Uncles lighting component company and did my best to just move on with my life. Wrestling was, during that time, just an after thought.
And life just passed me by. I neither looked up, nor waved.
So, life got in the way of my pursuit of whimsical fancy. Or did it? Sometimes things happen that lead you down certain paths. A pro wrestler, like Eddie Guerrero, might have been lead down a shorter path to reach wrestlings door, mine was more circuitous. But in the end the destination is the same and how we individually got there is soon lost in the shuffle of trying to open that door now that you are there.
I never followed Eddie during his time in Mexico with Art Barr when they were taking EMLL by storm. I knew, vaguely, of Chavo, Mando and Hector from their exploits in Southern California, but to be honest I never paid them any mind. I was all WCCW, WWF (E) and NWA/WCW. I was there for Chris Benoits coming of age, Ric Flair and the Horseman. LOD, it was ALL GOOD. Eddie came aboard, and I remember thinking that he was pretty good. But the powers that be never really pushed Eddie, so he was just one of many on an under utilized roster. Fast forward to WWE and the birth of the attitude era, WCW fell off my wrestling radar.
So, hindsight being what it is at 20/20 I am, in all actuality, a Johnny-come lately in the Eddie Guerrero appreciation bandwagon. When Chavito and Eddie started their "Lie Cheat and Steal" gimmick I soon fell in love with the ring work Eddie displayed day in and day out. His matches were superb, and he had that intangible "it factor" that is all too elusive in most wrestlers today. He had charisma, he had athletic ability. He had a personality like I never saw before, but with that being said, I am a fan of Eddie, the person. Wrestling a close second.
As you all may now know, Eddie fought some serious demons in his life. The addiction of alcohol and drugs took everything away from him he ever worked for. His career, his family, and about every dime he ever made. Imagine this for a second: he made it in one of the toughest vocations you could possibly imagine. He enjoyed a success in wrestling that no one else in his family was able to obtain. And they have been at it for over 70 years. He had a loving wife, beautiful children and life, as they say, was a peach. But his addiction to drugs and alcohol cost him all that. In 2001 he found himself unemployed, seperated from his wife and kids and deeply in debt to the IRS. His future was certainly in doubt. But he never gave up. He fought back those addictions, and with true guts, strength and conviction he not only got his life back, but he reunited with his wife, got his financial situation taken care of and re-signed with WWE. He went from being down and out in 2001 to winning the WWE Heavyweight Championship of the World in 2004.
So, I found myself following Eddies career. He was enjoying push, and I counted him on my short list of wrestlers I would actually mark out for. And I don't mark out for just anyone. "Cheating Death, Stealing Life" was played on my DVD player more then once and I realized I was becoming quite the student of Eddies. We even named Norton the Pot Bellied Pig, Norton Guerrero because of his penchent for lying, cheating and stealing. He would swear to you he hadn't been fed in six months! What a lie that was. I caught him stealing grapes (one of Nortons absolute favorites) from the fridge on more then one occasion, and he frequently cheated the other piggees here out of the food in their bowls long bout dinner time. Norton WAS Eddie, in Pig form.
Norton passed away very unexpectedly in September, Eddie followed a few months later. 2005 was not a good year for those with the name of Guerrero.
So, I have always wanted to wrestle. But I never did anything to realize that dream of mine. By the time I started to give it serious thought I felt I passed the age when going down that road was feasible. But I remember that sad November day when I heard Eddie passed on. At the time I was content with just being me, for better or worse, but while I was sitting here at this very computer and I heard Eddie passed onto bigger and better promotions in the sky I felt this compulsion to research wrestling schools. (With a smile) A whimsical compulsion. I quickly ran across the wrestling school of Playboy Buddy Rose and Colonel DeBeers, made the phone call that set me down this road. The very next weekend I set foot for the first time inside a pro wrestling ring, and the rest, as they say, is history.
I made a promise to myself, and to Eddie that day. I was going to give it hell, this little dream of mine, and I was doing it for Eddie. I never met the man, but he touched a spot in the heart that made me appreciate him so much. Like I said, aside from his wrestling skills, he was a true man. He represents to me what you can do if you put your mind to it. He had it rough. He went from the deepest dreges of rock bottom and went straight to the top. All in the while fighting forces and addictions that most people would have turned tail and ran from. He didn't let statistics and nay sayers dictate the outcome of his life. To quote William Henley and the poem Invictus, this definatley applied to Eddie:
"It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul."
So, now you all know. It's slightly Twilight Zonish now that I think of it. It took the death of my beloved Mother to deter me from my wrestling dream. And it took the death Of Eddie Guerrero to put me back on the path. Two very important people and influences on my life. I would gladly give it up to have them back, but since it is what is is, I am going to do this. I don't care what it takes. How long it takes. What others have to say and how much anything or anyone tries to hold me back. So, Mom and Eddie, this is for you! I will try to make you proud, and I am looking up to you in the hopes that you are smiling down to me!
~Finis
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