from Tao of the Weightlifter

Joe Bolton

Musculature as a way of life.

Breaking it down to build it.

Up. A burning in my shoulders.

Low-level professional wrestlers don't have much to do with Bolton's weightlifter aesthestic. My theory is that they specially train in order to maintain excess stomach flab. Last night's show in the Harmony Elementary School was comic, embarrassing, depressing, riveting, and boring in the style of most third-rate circus acts, birthday-party magicians, and Maine humorists who specialize in "Ayuh" as a punch line.

My younger son, however, thought it was great. After spending five dollars on a signed Doink the Wrestling Clown poster, he enthusiastically cheered and catcalled, with his favorite enemy being the Skunk, a remarkably revolting man in his fifties with a mohawk and a skunk-like cape, and a really big naked beer belly, who stage-whispered to the crowd that he was having a secret affair with Sarah Palin. Since he was the prepackaged bad guy of the match, he possibly thought that such a revelation would rile the crowd; but interestingly most spectators seemed to be indifferent to this news . . . possibly because ten-year-old boys were the only ones who cared about the "fight," and probably none of them were exactly sure who Sarah Palin was or what an affair with the Skunk might entail.

Bad wrestling does offer the crowd an opportunity to see how all the fake beatings really work: those tricky foot stompings that simulate loud punching and how one fat man can jump on top of another fat man without actually touching him and exactly where you can slap belly fat to make a big noise without causing damage.

The next big Harmony event is the haunted house at the grange. People are trying to talk me into dressing up as a witch and playing scary music on a very out-of-tune piano. So today I'm going to try to learn the chords to "I Put a Spell on You." I'll keep you posted on my progress. The piano is not my natural metier; perhaps they'll go for witchy fiddle instead. (I suppose that means "The Devil Went down to Georgia," doesn't it?)