Wrestling Buzz by Matt Keit

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My dad has always been very serious about winning. He always gets angry when he loses. I have two sisters, Bailey and Cameron. They both play field hockey and soccer. I also have a mom, but my parents are divorced, and she lives far away. I wrestle. I have wrestled for a while, and generally win. Once I got to the middle school, I joined there extremely competitive wrestling team.

My dad always would talk to us if we lost or did something wrong.

But, it was my first match against the toughest team in the division, and I was crushed, pinned almost immediately, but I was the only person to lose a round from my team.

Later that night my dad came into my bedroom and screamed at me. He told me that if I didn’t do better some bad things would happen. I of course just assumed he meant that I would lose my PlayStation or something, but I was wrong

Two weeks later we had another match against our big rival. I did pretty well, but lost my last round. I knew my dad wasn’t going to be happy. So when I got back to school I hopped on the bus and rode home.

I got to my gate, put in the code and walked up the driveway. I was hoping he went back to work, but up ahead I could see his silver Lexus at the garage door. Once I got to the house, I went in through the back door, rather than going in through the big, loud, front doors. I went upstairs and went to shower. I noticed a pair of clippers sitting on the sink, but didn’t think anything of it. I got in and a few minutes later my dad called in and told me to finish up. I did so, and dried off and walked down the hall to my room.

The light was on, and my door was open. When I got there, I noticed he was sitting on my bed with my desk chair next to him. But what I didn’t notice was he grabbed the clippers from the bathroom. He told me to sit down, and keep the towel on, and I obeyed. He was telling me how I was doing a bad job with wrestling, and that he warned me last week.

He duct taped my hands to the chair, grabbed the clippers and plugged them in. I instantly started squirming. I had been growing my hair out for months. I had the coolest long, brown undercut that I had just bleached about a month ago. I hadn’t cut the top of my hair in months, only going in to get the sides cut very few weeks. He told me to stop moving.

He grabbed a number 6 clipper and took a strip out of the side. Then he told me he was testing it. He put a number one guard on and buzzed all of my hair off. I looked terrible.

The next day I was getting ready to go, and I put a hat on. My dad came out and said goodbye, and took my hat off and threw it into the fireplace. I walked down the driveway in the cold winter air. I got on the bus and I sat by myself and kept my head down.

When I got to school everyone looked so surprised. I have always had the best hair, I even won an award once. And, now I had none. I felt more vulnerable than I baby deer. Then, the worst part happened; everyone felt my head.


A few weeks had gone by and my hair started to grow back. I had another wrestling tournament, and my dad warned me that if I did bad I’d have the same punishment. I did the best that I could and didn’t lose a single round.

It still bugs me why he did that. He had never done anything that severe before. Hmm.

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