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Hope and Gory
Chuck Palahniuk (author of Fight Club) writes about the Olympic wrestling trials. Amateur wrestling, not WWF or any of its ilk. The article for the most part gets it right. I was a wrestler. I have cauliflower ear. I cut too much wieght. I've walked off the mat and puked in a trash can. I broke my thumb once. I had ringworm. I did it all. And I wasn't even that good. So why did I do it? For the life of me, I really can't nail down a solid answer to that question, yet I know that if I could do it again, I would. Palahniuk focuses mostly on the physical pains of wrestling, but there's more to the sport than pain. Pain is a part of it, and its not a bad thing either (and Palahniuk does a good job describing this), but theres a lot of technique, elegance, and beauty in the sport as well. Sometimes it just takes a wrestler to recognize it when its happening. Which, I suppose, is why the sport has such a wierd reputation...

This post is part of the Kaedrin Weblog. It's been categorized under Culture and was originally published in May 2001.

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