Crazy Is My Superpower: How I Triumphed by Breaking Bones, Breaking Hearts, and Breaking the Rules

by A. J. Mendez Brooks

  When they came back to my register the next week, I started to get a little pissed. There were, yet again, two jugs of water skillfully hidden on the cart’s lower shelf. But now, joining the paraphernalia was a box of Brillo pads. I could understand stealing water, but no old guy was going to fall over dead because he couldn’t scrub stubborn eggs off a pan. But I couldn’t bring myself to call them out. And as they handed me two-year-old coupons for a cart full of food, I surrendered into being their dependable partner in crime.

  Maybe these adorable seniors were just too fragile minded to realize what they were doing. Maybe they really were desperate to save as much money as they could. When I watched them pull the cart into line at Customer Service to return all their items, including the stolen ones, for full price, I realized they were actually just crooked motherfuckers.

  As Customer Service checked their receipts, they realized I had approved a dozen coupons I shouldn’t have. The phone at my register rang and I picked it up to hear a shrill “Close your register and come to Customer Service right now.” My store manager—my boss—had been manning the counter that day and was about to make me pay. I hung my head and walked past the old crones fighting with her about not getting their money back and sullenly walked into her office.

  “I don’t want to see you back in my store. You just got this girl fired. Are you proud of yourselves?” she yelled as they reluctantly pushed the cart out of the store.

  “I don’t give a fuck!” the once adorable old lady yelled from her filthy thug mouth on the way out. I thought we were partners in crime, lady! Turns out I was just an easy mark for these criminal masterminds. I wouldn’t have been surprised to see them pull off their old people masks in the parking lot, jump into a running convertible, and speed away while flipping me off.

  “I could, and probably should, fire you right now,” the store manager began. “I don’t know why you would think it’s okay to approve expired coupons and cost my store money. But I’m just going to take that money out of your check. If it happens again, you’re out of here.”

  “Okay…I’m…sorry,” I managed to squeak out.

  “That doesn’t sound like a thank-you,” she said as I stood up to leave the room. Now, the woman had every right to can me right there. And I appreciated that she hadn’t. But the way she phrased that sentence just rubbed me wrong. As if I was supposed to grovel at the chance to continue making minimum wage. As if I was supposed to be happy that week’s hundred-dollar paycheck would now be reduced to fifty. Sure, I owed the store that money and was lucky I wasn’t being dragged into shopping mall jail, but she was trying to make me feel even smaller than wearing a blue smock and scrubbing butcher meat blood off a belt ten times a day already did. Now she wanted me to swallow my pride and thank her? Fuck. That. Noise. This was not the life I was supposed to be living.

  —

  A year ago I was a student at a prestigious school, living on my own, and trying to turn art into an actual career. I refused to grovel for fifty dollars. I was worth so much more.

  “No, thank you,” I calmly responded as I unpinned my name badge, tucked it into my pants pocket, and handed the manager my smock. As I walked out of the building I realized I hadn’t actually said the words I quit. To this day I wonder if they’re still waiting for me to show up to my afternoon shift. No matter. I was done throwing myself a pity party and living in shades of gray.

  I made it home in a daze. I think my brain was trying to panic about being jobless, but my body was too tired to notice. As I hopped into a steaming shower, my mind began to drift off. The scalding hot water felt painfully good against my skin. I sank down to sit cross-legged on the floor of the tub and closed my eyes beneath the heavy water. I felt my mind drift away from my body.

  I looked at the sad little creature beneath me. She had failed at school, failed at work, even failed at being a daughter. And now she was no one. Just a small girl, in a bathtub, talking to herself.

  And then I made a decision. Stand the fuck up. Cry out whatever tears you have left and let them rinse away down the drain. Today was a wash. Yet another failure to add to the list. Today I would allow myself to cry about it but force myself to realize there was nothing I could do to change the past. Whatever pain and depression I was feeling could have today, but it could not have tomorrow.

  Sounds about right.

  Things That Make Me Irrationally Scared

  • Revolving doors

  • The first step on a moving walkway

  • The last step off an escalator

  • Food that is close to the “Sell By” date

  • Cats sitting higher than the height of my face on a staircase I am walking up

  • Cats

  • When I am walking at a brisk pace toward an automatic door and it still hasn’t opened

  • Spiders/lint that could be confused for a spider from far away

  • The oil popping while cooking

  • Being chased…even as a joke, I will drop into the fetal position, cover my eyes, and curse at you

  • My teeth scraping on a wooden Popsicle stick

  • Accidentally incurring the wrath of a shaman

  • Flipping a sunny-side-up egg

  Things That Make Me Irrationally Angry

  • Children doing choreography

  • Sitting in a seat someone has just sat in and it’s still warm

  • Children with inexplicably sticky hands

  • Strangers who ask “Where do I know you from?” and expect you to start guessing

  • The B-52s’ song “Love Shack”

  • People who quote other people while doing an impression of that person

  • Women who use the phrase “my man”

  • Men in V-necks

  • Men in sandals

  • Backhand compliments (e.g., “I love how you don’t care what you look like without makeup.”)

  • Red nail polish

  • How no one from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has won an Emmy yet

  • Old people in movies using slang like “Get jiggy with it.” It’s not funny. It’s never funny.

  • When people use sad face emojis while texting about tragic events

  • Toe socks

  Things That Make Me Irrationally Happy

  • Coffee

  • When Lori and Barbara are on the Shark Tank panel at the same time

  • When old people kiss on the Kiss Cam

  • When someone refuses to kiss on the Kiss Cam and the Kiss Cam awkwardly stays on them for too long

  • The sound of dogs drinking water

  • The sound of a wooden dresser drawer opening and/or closing

  • Right angles

  • The tears of my enemies

  • That corn chip smell dogs get when they’re sleepy

  • Destiel FanFics

  • Overweight pigeons

  • Watching someone pull a door they are supposed to push and then get superconfused

  • Megan Fox

  • When chefs cut themselves on Chopped

  • More coffee

  • Children cursing

  • When dogs audibly fart and scare themselves

  The Mendez children. Erica is quietly considering squeezing my ribs until I pop.

  Adorably Evil.

  Flashing the horns on Easter Sunday.

  A crab who hates forced family functions (from left to right: me, Erica, Janet, Robbie, and Robert).

  Caterpillar-browed captain of my 7th grade Academic Bowl’s winning team.

  Celebrating my 18th birthday like an official adult.

  Signing autographs for my first trading cards.

  Mike Mastrandrea

  I was the referee for one of the greatest title matches in wrestling history.

  The fitting for my Kane mask. Skipping around the ring dressed as a tiny demon was one of my all-time favorite moments.

  In front of my first pay-per-view poster, busting out
one of the two poses I know.

  An official Mattel prototype of me as Kane. The outfit I wore in this segment was an homage to the Queen of Crazy, Harley Quinn.

  Opening Raw the night after my heel turn. Fun fact: I almost fell off the ladder during rehearsals.

  Mike Mastrandrea

  My finishing move, a submission called The Black Widow.

  Mike Mastrandrea

  Ugly crying after winning the championship.

  In the locker room, moments after beating the holy hell out of each other.

  Mike Mastrandrea

  My controversial “Pipebomb-shell” promo, in which I tore everyone new holes, resulted in almost a year of title defenses against every single female on the roster…

  Jonathan Bachman/AP Images for WWE

  …And culminated in defending the title against the entire roster at one time during my first WrestleMania match.

  Mike Mastrandrea

  A final bow.

  Just an ordinary day at the office.

  Seriously, guys, a completely ordinary day.

  Eve trying to convince me it’s not my fault that she’s retiring.

  When I was on a show at MSG, I found the exact seats my father and I had sat in years earlier.

  Heterosexual life partners in Paris.

  I climbed Lion’s Head Mountain in South Africa and then asked to piggyback down.

  Cathy and David Photography

  Erica fixing my hair before my wedding. She’s excited I am about to be someone else’s problem.

  Cathy and David Photography

  Erica, Dad, and me. He flew more than twelve hours to give away his favorite daughter.

  Cathy and David Photography

  These are my special occasion chucks because they’re covered in glitter.

  Cathy and David Photography

  Nerds.

  Cathy and David Photography

  Erasing my Google search history.

  Cathy and David Photography

  Me and all my friends.

  Esther Lin Photography

  I hope one day to find a love as strong as Phil and Larry’s.

  I am not very good at doing anything halfway. There is something about the middle ground that makes me want to jackhammer it into a steep hill and then watch things violently roll down it. People tend to find too much comfort in half measures. They want everyone to like them and so they never say anything too offensive. They never pick a side in an argument so they don’t lose a future ally. They don’t allow themselves to love completely so they avoid getting hurt. They never take too strong a stand on what they believe in for fear of standing alone.

  But for me, there is excitement in extremes. When I love, I love with every ounce of my twisted soul. And when friendships or relationships go south, I tend to set them on fire just to make sure they’re really dead. Because as the wise, young scholar Dylan McKay once said, “May the bridges I burn light my way.”

  If I have to apply to college, I’m going to put all my eggs into one basket and try to get into one of the most prestigious art schools in the country. If I’m going to work at a supermarket, you bet your sweet ass I’m going to be awarded with a gold name tag within a month. And when I decide to get off my ass and make something of my life, there is not a damn thing that is going to stop me.

  I had tried the traditional route touted in after-school specials and preached by practical adults. Go to school, live off your parents, get a nine-to-five job, don’t make too many waves, and politely wait for death. Living off my parents wasn’t going to be an option like it was for the majority of the kids I encountered at college. I helped pay the bills since I was fifteen. I tried to go to school and get myself out of my small town, but somehow ended up right where I started. If insanity really was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, I was going to have to change things up.

  I tried making my academic dreams come true and that was a bust, so now it was time to dust myself off and explore that other childhood fantasy. While most people would love to be the wild thing they dreamed of as a wide-eyed child, actually jumping in with both feet to make it happen seems like an absurd indulgence. There is no safety in that. There are no guarantees like there would be, say, working your way up the Pathmark corporate ladder. But at eighteen, I had nothing to lose. And so I made up my mind.

  When I was twelve years old, I promised myself I would become a real-life superhero. I would be strong and powerful, brave and independent. This scrawny, five-foot-two, one-hundred-pound asthmatic nerd with knotted hair and acne was going to join the supermodels and bodybuilders before her, and somehow—some way—become a professional wrestler.

  So first things first. I needed money. While at the time most women in professional wrestling were scouted from modeling jobs, that most certainly was not going to be my way in. I’ve always been fine with my looks, but that’s not because I think I’m conventionally attractive. I know I’m nowhere near a model. On my best day, with the assistance of highly skilled professionals I’m a television 6, which equals a solid Jersey 8. And that doesn’t mean I’m insecure or a fisher of compliments. I’m just comfortable with my appearance in the same way a dog is comfortable licking his crotch in the center of a crowded room. It is what it is, and if you’re uncomfortable looking at me, that’s your own damn problem.

  I think that’s mostly because I’ve never put much stock in my appearance. The majority of my life was spent in sweats with my dirty hair pulled back to accentuate my troubled skin. I just didn’t care. And the act of not caring what anyone thought made me feel incredibly free. Being comfortable with myself meant not needing the approval of others to build my confidence. That’s not something any caring adult taught me. No one gently guided me into womanhood by helping me see my inner beauty. I just innately knew my value. I knew it because the world seemed to be denying it and that just made me want to prove it even more. My value was not in my looks but in my mind. I knew I was smart, funny, creative, and tough. What I brought to the world was going to be something of my mind’s creation, not my body’s.

  But I also knew the pro-wrestling industry had a high standard of beauty, which I just couldn’t measure up to. I figured I could just fake my way through that particular requirement somewhere down the line. But to get my foot in the door and to one day make an indelible mark, I was going to have to bring something else—something undeniable—to the table. What really mattered, and what was truly lacking in the landscape, was skill.

  There was a glorious golden age for women in wrestling over a decade back, when the roster had plenty of talented, well-rounded athletes, who were just as physically imposing as their male counterparts. But over time the major companies had repackaged the concept of a female wrestler. Now the majority were amazing to look at but not so amazing inside of the ring. So the only examples I had of female successes were jacked-up Amazonian goddess–like weightlifters or drop-dead gorgeous, voluptuous sexpots. On a scale of 1 to 10, I was a negative 14 for both categories. I couldn’t change that. But what I could control was how good a wrestler and performer I would become. I knew what my currency could be. And it wasn’t going to be found in any of the trails made before me. I was going to have to create my own path.

  And for that I needed professional training. But for professional training, I needed a lot of money. So the day after my Pathmark walkout, I opened a newspaper and called, literally, every Wanted ad. Even if I had none of the skills they were looking for, I called every office building, every store in a thirty-mile radius. Eventually, a small prepaid calling card company two towns over invited me to interview for a secretary position. With virtually no experience, I got the part-time job. After two days, I talked my way into making the position full-time. I went from making around $100 a week to about $300, and at the time I genuinely thought I had entered the highest of tax brackets. Though I wanted to swim atop a bed covered in my hard-earned fistful of bills, instead I opened my f
irst bank account. I had a game plan and a debit card. I was on my way to becoming a full-fledged adult.

  —

  Wrestling schools around the world can often be heartless scams meant to take money from clueless wannabes with lofty dreams. I wasn’t sure if the school I found in an empty warehouse on a sketchy Jersey street was one of those, but I knew for sure that was how they saw me—an all-too-small, incapable wannabe who was trying to enter a world she wasn’t tough enough for. I know this because the owner of the school came out and told me so. “You know this hurts, right? You’re a little girl and you could get really injured. But if you want to pay the tuition, you’re in.”

  The entrance to my first wrestling training school on a street where it was easy to get shanked in broad daylight.