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Pink Boy returns to support the real fighters

Posted: Sep 21st 2016 By: Dave Schlenker

After I fell off a giant gingerbread house in a dress, I assumed my wrestling days were over.

Turns out, the local wrestling community — led by WWE Hall of Famer Dory Funk Jr. — has no use for namby-pamby excuses. Sure, I was holding a giant cupcake and wearing a wig when I tumbled from that gingerbread house and broke my wrist. But in professional wrestling, MUCH stranger things happen.

First, an update: My wrist is finally healed following that fateful December evening when a 7-foot-high prop tumbled, tossing its lone passenger — me playing Mother Ginger — onto the stage. It was during a dress rehearsal for "The Nutcracker," a lovely ballet that was rebelling against its non-lovely cast member.

I spent about six months either in a cast or in a brace, as my 48-year-old scaphoid (a small bone but apparently an important one) declined to heal. The wrist is fine now, although I can predict the weather just like my step-father could with his arthritis.

Fast Forward: Recently, I was dubbed a Real Man who Wears Pink. The Real Men campaign is raising money for the American Cancer Society as part of its Making Strides Against Breast Cancer effort. Pink signifies breast cancer awareness and support for patients.

My fellow Pink Men and I are competing to raise the most money for the cause. I do love a competition. I also despise breast cancer, which took down my mother and continues to plague friends. So I am here to play.

Problem is, I — unlike the other Pink Men — have no marketable skills. At the end of the day, I am a guy who writes cat jokes for a dwindling newspaper readership.

I described this quandary to Funk and his wife, Marti, friends who have been very supportive of local charities. Marti's answer was simple: Come back to the ring, just like you did years ago for two other community fundraisers (one of which, incidentally, helped me kiss a horse for a literacy campaign).

A few things of note here: I am not a big man. I am not even a medium man. The head shot that runs with this column is about actual size. Years ago, when I first approached the Funks about helping me for the literacy council, I envisioned a night of me running around like a scrawny goofball amid guys who could break me at will. The Funks agreed to let me into their ring on one condition. Kill the goofball act and actually wrestle. Like REALLY wrestle. I needed to train with them and actually fight.


I did. And it worked out great, although I was sore for weeks. A year later, I was a guest referee in a match that raised funds for Cameras With A Cause. I thought the referee would be safe, but if you have ever seen professional wrestling, you know there is no safe spot inside those ropes.

So when the Funks invited me back recently to raise money for my quest to punch cancer in the face, I bravely stood up and proclaimed, "Heck no! I still have a boo-boo from that nasty gingerbread-dress incident." But Dory Funk Jr., master of the spinning toe hold and Texas Razor Wire matches, has a
talent for changing the minds of sissi is.

Thus, on Friday, Sept. 23, and Saturday, Sept. 24, I will be a guest referee again. Proceeds will benefit Making Strides Against Breast Cancer and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Marion County. Matches start at 7 p.m. both nights at the !BANG! TV Sound Stage, 2501 SW 57th Ave., Unit 605, Ocala.

I start training soon, and I am nervous. My face hit the mat hard during the last referee gig. No joke.

But I know this much: No struggle — be it wrestling massive humans or weathering stubborn gingerbread injuries — compares to what cancer patients and their families face. Wrestling with craggy bones at 48? No problem. Even if I survive with both wrists intact, I remain a whiny wad of goo
in the shadow of life's real people in pink.