I've been slacking on putting up pictures!  Here are some from this past weekend in O-town:

At the Orlando Science Museum with Amy and her two bros, Dan and Dave.  Notice that Amy and I look nearly as tall as Dan and Dave in this pic, but they are both over 6'!

Look, you can't see us!

Maybe Amy and Dave really want to be dentists!

Amy with her family's cute dog, Yoshi!  This picture does not do justice to how much energy Yoshi has.

Me and Amy's fam in front of Northland Church.  In the background is the new building they will open in the next month or so.  What a beautiful day!

For the past three days now, I've been in a state of sadness and perhaps despair and confusion over the tragedy of the Benoit family.  After spending hours talking with close friends about this, I'm only finally able to write out what I want to say in what I hope will be therapeutic to me, and maybe other people will begin to understand how devastating and tragic this news is.

I got back into wrestling in 1996 during my freshman year in college.  I had been a fan growing up as a child, watching with my grandfather and sister until I thought I grew out of it.  One night while I was setting up the tv in our dorm room, Devesh and I were flipping through stations and wrestling was on.  We decided, "hey, why not" and started watching.  That year, we endured ridicule as people in our hall would stop by and see what we were doing.  How many times have I heard "you know, wrestling is fake!"  Quick answer: YES, I KNOW...(along with perhaps some profane retorts).  Along the way, I remember watching Chris Benoit, a quiet tough guy who had exciting matches, but wasn't all that great on the mic.  Quite honestly, among my circle of friends, I was the biggest Chris Benoit fan out of all of us.  I appreciated his imaginitive counter moves, his speed and agility, how despite his lack of size (he was 5'10 in a business where 6'6 is the norm), how much heart and courage he displayed in the ring.  One thing about Chris that stood out was how real he was.  He didn't do gimmicks, wear outlandish outfits, talk crazily or act outrageously.  He played a legitimate tough guy because he was a legitimate tough guy. 

While following his career over the years, the impression I got from reading about him and seeing real interviews about him was that he was a quiet, humble, hard worker who was among the most highly respected guys among his peers.  He said himself that he loved his family, and this I believe he did.  One PWTorch columnist put it this way: If one third of all wrestlers are labeled as absolute jerks, one third are great guys, and the last third is somewhere in between, Chris Benoit would be one of the greatest of the great guys.  One of the greatest parts of seeing him win the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania 20 was the knowledge that he was a great guy, who's hard work had finally put him at the pinnacle of the work he so loved doing. 

This is what also makes this story so unbelievable.  A guy who I had followed since 1996 and whom even his own friends and peers knew him as a great guy had within him the ability to kill his wife and 7 year old son.  In case you missed the news, police came into the Benoit household and found Nancy Benoit tied up and asphyxiated, Daniel Benoit in his bed, apparently asphyxiated with a plastic bag, and Chris Benoit hung on his workout machine in the basement.  

Those are the facts, and the following is the most realisticly plausible conjecture that I have seen: Daniel Benoit had been diagnosed with Fragile X Syndrome, which causes mental and physical retardation.  Chris and Nancy kept this secret from almost everyone for many years, but as Daniel grew older, he needed more care than Nancy could provide on her own.  The two argued for years over what to do with Daniel, with money and the desire for Chris to be home versus his need to be out on the road to support their family being obvious stressors.  At the age of 8, most children are put into a special hospital that costs upwards of $300,000 a year.  With insurance, a family needs to pay some 10-40% of this total.  From this point, I will quote Wade Keller, PWTorch Editor:

"The news of Benoit's son having Fragile X Syndrome, now confirmed by WWE, sheds more light into what may have contributed to stress in the Benoit marriage dating back to the 2003 divorce petition filed by Nancy. While it is a factor, as is the case with the possibility of steroids being a factor, no one factor likely will explain such actions as Chris's over the weekend. It is clear that a wide range of factors may have contributed to Chris's actions, including ones we haven't even had a hint of yet. But steroids, his schedule, his injuries, pain pills, marital difficulties, and stress from raising a son with Fragile X Syndrome are all known factors contributing to Chris's state of mind and lifestyle over the years. No one factor yet can be conclusively removed from consideration, nor can any of them be ruled in as a current or primary factor, in my opinion."

With this in mind, speculation of what happens follows something like this: In a fit of rage (perhaps caused by steroid abuse) Chris killed Nancy, then having come down from the rage expressed remorse and embarked on a downward spiral of despair where he had to figure out what to do and come to grips with being a murderer.  He looked at his son and felt nobody else he knew could love him the way he did and could not bear to see him lead his life without a mother and with a father who was a killer.  These realizations led him to lose all hope and the result is what police found on Monday afternoon. 

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Having laid out all of this, and honestly, nobody will ever know if this is what happened or what Chris' mindset was this past weekend, here is what my end result is.  I feel nothing but the greatest sympathy for Daniel and Nancy Benoit.  They are the true victims in this entire ordeal.  Chris Benoit committed the most heinous and horrifying acts possible at the end of his life.   

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I am concerned about our knee jerk reactions to this tragedy.  My friends have an email thread entitled "Benoit is EVIL".  I read on a forum that somebody hoped Benoit would be wrestling his next match in a special section of hell.  I don't think this is quite right, but I understand the emotion behind it.  Does one act define a man?  How about 3?  If you were to argue that killing your wife, kid and then yourself defines you forever as evil, many would agree with you.  I struggle with this thought, as I hope there can be redemption for all of us.  This is where discussion of philosophy, ethics and religion come in. 

If one thing is obvious, we are way too prone to hero worship in our society and this shows we never really know what people are like in their private lives - even people who we work with or have known for years.  I will not defend or excuse Chris Benoit's actions in any way, and I will never be able to watch a Chris Benoit wrestling match the same way again.  At the same time, I pity and have sympathy for the situation that thrust Chris into his mindset.  These situations certainly do not justify murder though.

I have many more thoughts on this, especially about our reaction, but those will have to be written another time. 

I benched 225 lbs today!