I have a startling confession to make! In less than a year after leaving
the Caribbean to pursue my dream of becoming a professional wrestler and I am
back there again! Back working in finance, back on boats, back drinking rum.
However, please do not lose faith in me. This was only for a two month contract
and I have once again left the Caribbean to be involved in British
wrestling. Who knew this once in a life time decision would occur so
frequently!?
To add to my time not wrestling, I also had appendicitis
shortly after my return to England and had to have my appendix removed recently.
I now won’t be wrestling until the New Year. Annoying, but all this time away
does give me time to reflect on what has been going on during the last year.
Just Relax Mon
The other confession I must make is I had an awesome time away from
wrestling and back in the British Virgin Islands. I have put so much pressure
on myself in the last year to be successful at my wrestling endeavors that it
was nice to just relax and have fun. Thank you to everyone who made my time
great there.
The time away has shown that I am taking this all a bit too
seriously and a lot of the time I am actually a bit miserable, which is really
a bit stupid when I’m meant to be doing something I enjoy. I do still love
wrestling and I do not for one minute regret my decision to come back, but I do
not enjoy my constant worry about how well my match went or how many people are
going to buy tickets to my wrestling show. I am a natural stress-head and to
some extent I like it, but there is a limit - which I have certainly crossed
this year. As my BVI brothers would say ‘you need to chill out mon’ (usually
followed by a fist pump that I awkwardly try to shake hands with).
True
Grit the 3rd
Talking of ticket sales, I recently ran the third True Grit show.
10,000 flyers out to our target audience, 100’s of posters put up, months of
tweets and Facebook posts. Excellent work! Come show time, a draw of 100
people. Shit! That wasn’t fun!
I do like running wrestling shows and I do think from a
creative and management side I am good at it. However getting people through
the door is very frustrating! The third show itself was yet again amazing and
the few people who did come loved it. I know the product is good and will
continue to improve every show. However, I was naïve to think we would
be having sell-out shows straight away and I think that will take time to
build. 2015 I will do everything in my power to make TGW a success…….and if any
TGW fans are reading this bring a mate next time would you.
Trav-Aid
The night following True Grit was a very special night. It was
Trav-Aid, which was a show organised by Harvey Dale to raise money for my good friend Kris Travis
who was recently diagnosed with stomach cancer. I am pleased to confirm that
Trav has now had the cancer cut out and is currently receiving chemotherapy. He
is still in remarkably good spirits and has shown such strength. I’m sure we
will one day be seeing him in a wrestling ring again.
Trav-Aid saw myself and LJ Heron (who was replacing Scotty Hexx)
against my old clique brothers El Ligero and Cameron Knite. This was Cameron’s
first match in 9 years. I’m sure Cam would readily admit he is not in ring
shape at the moment, but that said he was absolutely fantastic! We had a few
rickets to start with (that’s wrestler speak for the bits that don’t look too
good), but by the end Cam was on fire. He hit a Northern Lights suplex with a
wrestler’s bridge that would put most pros to shame. He also hit a picture
perfect Swanton Bomb to finish the match. The man is a natural talent and it is
a shame British wrestling lost him. I certainly hope this won’t be the last time
I will be sharing a ring against my old wrestling nemesis.
What’s Next?
So what do I want from all of this? What is the end goal? These are
questions I’ve never really answered.
In the short term I hope to become a more regular performer on the
British circuit. I will be making more of an effort to get my name out now I
have had a year back in the industry. I also hope to continue running my own
shows and hope that crowd numbers will soon reflect what the shows deserves.
In the long term…….Wrestlemania baby! Ok maybe not and and I certainly don't want to live in a permanent state of dream chasing that seems to plague some people and just causes unhappiness. That doesn't make sense to me (although I have been guilty of it myself). Long term I just want to be
involved in something that I’m passionate about and I want to be as good at it as I
can be. It would be good to make a valid contribution to the world of wrestling
that I can look back on and be proud of. Hopefully I will come out the other
side a better person for it......the film 'The Wrestler' had a happy ending right??
Final Thoughts
It’s been a real up and down year. On one hand I’ve had no money and
it has been a bit of a lonely existence. On the other hand I have taken the
steps I intended to take, I have had such fun wrestling and met new and old
friends who share a similar love for this strange business. I am looking
forward to continuing my journey with a slightly more relaxed attitude in
future. Succeed, fail or anything in between my goal now is just try to enjoy
the ride.
Thank for reading!
JCT
