Blog of the fan-turned-pro wrestler Ben Monaco

Monday 16 November 2015

Life Imitating Art...(Part 2)

So to continue on the last post, I had an interesting episode at the gym this morning...

I ran into an acquaintance of mine, this middle-aged bodybuilder who I met this summer through common friends and, yet again, my job. This guy has an impressive physique. Big arms, tight abs and shoulders as broad as the prairie sky (good lord, I'm being poetic). Every time I've run into him at the gym or elsewhere, he's greeted me with a big muscled hug and a cheeky grin. He's originally from the west coast of the US. He's chatty, flirty and always a delight to talk to. I sort of had a sense that he had a bit of a crush on me despite him being in a relationship with a nearly-as-muscled man. 

I saw him last week at roughly the same time. He asked me about work, school etc. and he promise to come and see me at the store this past weekend. Well, as life sometimes gets in the way, he never dropped in. But as my earlier post can attest, I had my hands full already. So in the end it wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Regardless, when he saw me today he apologized profusely because he didn't want me to think of him as being flaky (a stereotype of west-coasters that he's been trying to avoid). In my own little flirty way, I told him it was OK but he better watch out because next time "I might beat him up" if he didn't show.

Now here's the fun part... He replies with a big smile "You promise?" He then launches into an unsolicited discourse about how much he loves wrestling, how he wrestled in high school, how he thinks it's amazingly hot and how he would wrestle me any day.

Seriously. I must have some good karma from a previous life or something. The first time I saw this guy, my mind went to wrestling as it does with just about any guy who catches my eye. But to have him flip the tables on me...total shock. 

I quickly explained to him that I too shared his enthusiasm about the sport and briefly spoke about my work with BG East. We resolved to one day soon meet up and throw down on the mats. I bravely told him I would kick his ass. He flexed his biceps and pecs and replied "You sure about that?"

The lesson from these two stories for you, my dear readers, is to go out there and take chances. Had the little buff wrestler from my previous post kept quiet, we would have missed out on an amazing new friendship and a hot match. Had I not dared today to flirt in a semi-wrestling oriented way, I never would have discovered this bodybuilder's shared passion. 

So regardless of what it is in your life my dear readers, heed my advice: go out there and make your dreams happen :)

Life Imitating Art...(Part 1)

Some days, you get lucky.

Hello dear readers! I've had a rather interesting past couple of days that warrant a good blog post. As most of you have already read, I'm in a very busy stretch of existence since I'm back in school, completing another bachelor's. On top of those mental gymnastics, I'm also working part-time in a clothing store and currently have a grand total of 0 days off in my week. This has been a source of considerable exhaustion, but the semester is wrapping up and I'm soon going to be able to breathe for at least a few days. That being said, my life still has some interesting episodes that truly astound me.

When I chose the title of this post, I figured this was an appropriate title given that the events I'm about to go into sound quasi-scripted, almost like something out of a movie or someone's harlequin wrestling scenarios...if they existed :P

I was at work the other day, things were going along quite smoothly. Clients in, clients out, the basic kind of Friday afternoon I have grown accustomed to. Out of nowhere, like a gale force wind, these two guys blow into the store. Both seem friendly, charming, enthusiastic about their shopping endeavors. They're up from New York for the weekend to celebrate one of their birthdays. The birthday boy is zipping around, trying on some stuff, the other is far more concerned with his phone. He seemed to be looking up something...

They both end up trying things on. The birthday boy is set on a coat and a sweater. The shorter, buff one finds a light jacket after some failed attempts with some other items. One was a sweater whose sleeves were too tight, so tight in fact he said they were like "arm singlets" which I found to be a curious choice of words...

Finally, he comes up to me, flashes his cell at me and asks "Is this you?" and I immediately recognize the layout of meetfighters.com and see my profile pic staring right back at me. "Why yes it is" I reply, a bit dumbfounded. Right away, my mind is running through profiles I remember. Who is this little buff stud? Finally we whisper to each other and I confirm that I know this guy. He tells me his friend knows about his wrestling-side so we wouldn't need to sugar coat things in front of him.

At the cash, he gives me his number and email. I write him asap. He writes back. I write back. He writes back... My day eventually ends and I meet up with the two for a night out. We have fun, I flirt with the little wrestler. Eventually, we end up saying good night to the birthday boy and...well...needless to say it was a hell of a hot match. A very, very, very late night match. So a perfectly normal afternoon turned into a crazy hot night. I'll definitely meet up with this little stud again one day for a rematch.

But this post is "Part 1"...as it would happen, a second event occurred today that promises to be very interesting as well...but more on that in the next post ;)