PART ONE
Now bodybuilders have no idea why they want to look the way they do, but years ago most people that became involved in the cult of bodybuilding, either as competitors or fans, had a “moment”. A moment they saw a certain magazine or movie. Mine was seeing Rocky 3 in 1982. I was born in 1973 so I was 9 years old when I saw Rocky 3 in the Bronx, NY(Parkchester) where I lived until I was 9 years old and then the neighborhood changed and became more dangerous and mostly African-American(not at all saying there is a connection). My Mom got involved with some hippie thing called primal therapy and EST with a guy named Werner Erhard so moved us out to Santa Monica, Ca. when I was 9 and I grew up on the westside of Los Angeles. I didn’t really have much of a father figure which is a trait many that join our cult have.
Anyway, when I saw Rocky 3 some of the black kids in the Bronx audience were fucking rooting for Clubber Lang! They yelled “fuck that white boy up” but I saw Rocky’s physique and saw a sense of empowerment. I was getting bullied pretty bad as well. One time these black kids stole my bike, and I ran home because I was afraid to fight them alone. Our apartment had an intercom thing where you could be buzzed in, and the intercom went off, and the kids said “Hey Notomorrow(obvious name change), we’re having a lot of fun with your bike punk”. My Mom was there and heard the intercom, and the Italian Mom in her kicked in and she said, “Listen you little motherfuckers, I’m coming down and beating the shit out of you if you don’t leave my son’s bike and run the fuck away”. I’ll just be really honest; I think she might have used the “N word” and I am sorry for that and don’t condone it, but she saw her 9-year-old son abused.
Anyway, we moved to Santa Monica, California, a whole coast away and my Mom started dating a bodybuilder named Jay that worked out at Golds. She took me on one of her dates with him to a place called JOJO’s(later Cocos) in Westwood which was an underground restaurant, where you walked downstairs into it from the street. It was super cool and had a Pac Man machine which I played while Jay and my Mom sat at the table. At 9 years old, I was a master at Pac Man and got to the end of the game, as after a certain amount of keys (anyone that knows the original Pac-Man arcade game knows what passing key levels means).
Then Jay, my mom and I went and saw a mediocre film called Firefox with Clint Eastwood. Eastwood, while not as jacked as Stallone, was also a bodybuilder and tough guy so my image of masculinity was being developed. I also saw the way people responded to Jay. He had an 80s physique, not grotesque, more Zane like, and he commanded attention. He was also a gentleman and treated my Mom well. He ended up giving me a jar of Joe Weider’s BIG protein powder. He told me to mix it with a banana to hide the taste(tasted like SHIT). But I was hooked. At 9 years old with ectomorph genetics, I wanted to build my physique. I wanted to build my confidence. I wanted the “eye of the tiger” and I was hooked.
Part 2 coming soon........