Accompany me, if you will, into the Wayback Machine as we set the controls for December of 1989. This was a time when youth culture was ruled by a few unique things. MTV was of course the biggest, bringing its three and a half minute blasts of awesomeness to fans of not only pop music, but also the emerging musical style of hip hop which was coming into its own, and the already over-saturated and doomed to be short lived genre we called “glam metal”, a true dichotomy of a genre if there ever was one. I’d liken it to a conundrum wrapped in an enigma, except for the fact that few involved with this particular style would understand what either of those words mean.

Another cultural achievement that ruled our young lives was the shopping mall, and particularly the food court. On weekends, malls would be awash with teenagers who had nothing better to do but to congregate in these special sections of malls while munching on any number of tasty yet wholly unhealthy foods, and then roaming the mall for hours, in and out of stores and the common areas until the mall closed and your parents picked you up, or if you were lucky, you got to o to the late show at the adjoining movie theater before being picked up from there.

The third in the late 80’s trinity of teenage culture was Professional Wrestling. Yes, I know, wrestling had been around long before we got hold of it (or it of us, more correctly), and it still brings in the fans today. The 1980s though, was a golden age when the… well, I hate to use the word “sport” but for lack of a better descriptor… sport went from just being popular to being absolutely huge. Professional wrestling permeated every possible corner of pop culture and made stars out of almost everyone who were featured. There were record albums, toys, movies, comic books, and even Saturday morning cartoons featuring wrestling stars. Even people who couldn’t stand to watch wrestling knew enough about it and were familiar with the wrestling stars of the day.

It is in this environment my story takes place. I was in my senior year of High School that year and quite active in the arts. This was my fourth year of being in Concert Choir, which I actually lettered in. Yeah, exactly, I didn’t know you could do that either, but there we are.

Anyway, one of the perks of being in the choir in December was that you got one day off each year for a field trip to go and sing. Sometimes we would be one of many schools featured in an all day Carol fest at our local mall. Other years, though, we went to Lambert international Airport, St. Louis, and roamed around dressed in our Choir robes, singing carols out for all to hear. I have always thought it was a nice gesture to spread some Christmas cheer to the weary traveler in the amazingly drab building that passes for an airport here in the Lou. Although in hind sight, this may have just been an excuse for our directors to get out of the classroom for the day. Either way, we were always happy to go.

So, 1989 was an airport year. We’d been dutifully roaming the halls en masse, singing carols and holiday themed songs from a small booklet we all carried with us. We would occasionally stop where we could all gather together and sing as the full Choir, and there were probably about 30 to 40 of us so this was kind of a big deal. We’d sing in several areas where people were waiting to board, in one of the many available lobbies, and especially to people who had recently departed their planes, heading for their luggage.

As I remember things, it was toward the end of the day when some passengers were coming into the terminal after just having landed. That’s when my friend James said, “Dude… that’s Flyin’ Brian.”

“What? No it’s not.” was the reply from someone else who’s name I forget at this point. Joe? Adam, maybe? Rob? I don’t remember.

“No, I think it is. WCW is in town tonight. that’s Flyin’ Brian!

“Holy crap (only he didn’t say “crap”), it is!”

Now, about this time our choir director who we’ll call Kevin, because that’s his name, was beginning to congregate the choir and move us on to our next point, which was probably to the bus home. That’s when he noticed that a small group of us were not congregating with the others and certainly not going anywhere. So he came over to hurry us along.

We were ready for him. We excitedly explained that the wrestlers were beginning to get off the plane and could we please go get some autographs, it’ll only be a minute. Being a responsible adult, he wasn’t so sure about our plan. Can’t blame him of course, since he was in charge of us numbskulls and we were about to accost total strangers who we believed to be wrestling stars.

I remember very specifically telling him that Flyin’ Brian Pillman was standing just twenty feet from us, a once in a lifetime event.

“I don’t know guys, are you sure it’s him?” asked our honorable director.

“Pretty sure it’s him…” said James, “and that THAT’S TERRY FUNK!!!”

With these words, Kevin straightened up, adjusted his tie, and walked over to Terry Funk with what can only be described as a “purpose”. One would have half expected him to go give a lecture about how he and his colleagues were ruining young minds. Then he spoke these words:

“Mr. Funk. I’d just like to say I’m a huge fan…”

And I have no idea what he said after that because IT WAS ON! We were all rushing around to talk to any wrestler getting off the plane and making them sign their autographs in our sheets of caroling music. Mr. Koontz had given us the okay, and it was the coolest thing one of my teachers had ever done (and I had a lot of cool teachers!). He only let us go for a few minutes but it was more than enough.

Remember now, we are all in our Choir robes and had just been singing about reindeers, Santa, and the baby Jesus. So as fun as this story is from our perspective, what must have it been like for these wrestlers who were just getting off the plane in yet-another-airport to go to yet-another-match in their schedule just like any other day? I can only imagine.

I don’t remember everyone who was there, I’m sure there were a few more wrestlers I am forgetting. But I do know that Flyin’ Brian was trying to hold back laughter while talking to us and signing our music sheets. I’m not sure if he thought we were the biggest dorks in the world, or if the situation was just too goofy and unexpected to be taken seriously, or both, but it was all he could do to keep it together.

We also met one of the Von Erich brothers, but I can’t for the life of me remember which one. I remember he was very nice, though a little taken aback and confused by all of this.

Pretty sure we blew Terry Funk’s mind. He kindly signed every piece of paper but seemingly couldn’t figure out what to make of these high school kids in weird black and red robes freaking out over wrestlers while others sang Christmas carols at them. It was too weird, he couldn’t process it. But he went with it, because what else could he do?

Oh yeah, that’s the other thing. There were only a handful of us doing the autograph thing. The rest of the choir continued to sing on. presumably in an effort to try and keep some decorum about all of this. Which only made it weirder.

Anyway, that’s the gist of it. The Carol sheets with the signatures are long gone now, unfortunately. They were either mistakenly thrown away when moving out of my parent’s house, or a victim of Amber, the cocker spaniel puppy who ate everything in my room from records to tee shirts to books, whatever she could get hold of. I do wish I still had it since it’s such a fun memory of a weirdo, once in a lifetime thing.

You may think it strange to be telling what is essentially a Christmas story now while it’s still Summer. Ordinarily, you would be correct, but it just so happens that Terry Funk passed away last week, so I thought this was a good time to share. While I haven’t watched wrestling on any sort of regular basis for about twenty years or so (WCW RIP) but Terry Funk was a constant back then and I remember watching several of his matches. Many of them made me happy, but none of them as much as the day I sang Christmas Carols for wrestlers.

Rest well, Mr. Funk. May the heavenly choirs sing you into the afterlife…without creepily asking for an autograph.

See you next week.