Some of my fondest memories from childhood involve suplexes, DDTs and body slams. All before I was eight years old, and all at the hands of my father.
He and I would watch Jake (The Snake) Roberts, (Macho Man) Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan on the then-named World Wrestling Federation. Afterward, we'd re-enact their battles.
I'd squeal with delight at his melodrama as he tapped his elbow and flew at me with mock wrestler rage. My sisters played too, but cried or lost interest before me.
I refused to back down, at least until my mom bellowed from the other room: "Garry! Would you stop it! Someone's going to get hurt!"
But no one ever did. At least not really hurt. He was the best kind of villain, the unheard-of sort who would rather throw himself in front of a speeding bus than cause any harm to one of his "victims" - his three girls.
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When I was 16, I asked him how he felt about having only daughters and no boys. Did he feel cheated?
"What did I miss out on? Nothing," he said.
I suppose, as the most willing opponent for those wrestling matches, I am the closest he'll ever come to having a son.
Not that I'm a tomboy by anyone's standards. I'm more like a girl with boyish idiosyncrasies, such as a compulsion to flex my biceps in front of mirrors and complete strangers.
This somewhat masculine charm has served me well since I play both mom and dad to my five-year-old daughter, Ava, on a daily basis.
Like the one I grew up in, my adult home is dominated by the fairer sex. It's me and her. Considering the strong nature of both our personalities (she is willful, opinionated and independent; like mother, like daughter, I suppose) our house is barely big enough for the two of us. Nor is it always equipped to contain our own wrestling matches.
This is how they began.
As much as I try to encourage her to entertain herself, there's a point when the single parent of an only child must relent and play. But I hate little kids' games. Barbies are boring, colouring wears thin and there are only so many hiding spots in a 1,200-square-foot townhouse.
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To distract her from these tedious pursuits, I'd simply drop to all fours and growl like an animal. Back to basics.
Ava never once cowered, screamed or even ran. Not my girl. Instead, she would scrunch up her otherwise cherubic face and fix a look of ferocity in her grey-blue eyes. Then, this beauty would run toward the beast (me) with full-throttle force and at least one "hiyah!" for emphasis.
"Wres-a-leen" (her pronunciation) is now a frequent activity, like dolls or painting, in our home. And it's one we both prefer. After a long day of work and daycare, she'll hop into her car seat and say, "Can we wrestle when we get home, mama?"
It didn't occur to me there might be anything wrong with or strange about our physical play, until I came across an article in a parenting magazine.
The writer's intention was to calm mothers' fears about uncles and grandpas who insist on rough play. Only upon reading it did I clue in that my nightly brawls with Ava might not be something every mom does. I asked around. Not one mom I surveyed wrestled with her offspring, unless there was a snowsuit involved.
And then it occurred to me that I'd never even seen my dad roughhouse with Ava.
"Does Grandpa ever wrestle with you?" I asked her recently on a night when he, she and I ate dinner together.
"No," she said, and looked at me with those five-going-on-15-year-old eyes.
"Why not?" I asked my dad. "You always used to with us."
"I'm too old for that now," he said.
Perhaps. Or maybe the reason is that Ava is neither his girl nor his boy, but his precious first grandchild and, thus, his dainty princess.
Still, I was shocked to realize that he has never cracked her toes, tickled her senseless or put her in a mock headlock. And this brought me to another realization.
"Does Daddy ever wrestle with you?" I asked Ava. My daughter spends every second weekend with her dad on his family's farm. I often feel foolishly competitive toward the horses, cows and army of cousins out there. It's a wonderland I can't equal.
"No," she said. Her incredulous expression added, "Don't you know wrestling is for mommies and little girls?"
I'd like to ask her dad why he doesn't roughhouse with his daughter. When he and I were a couple, I witnessed several wrestling matches between him and his nephews, much to their glee. Does he think she's too delicate or too much of a girl?
I want to ask him. But, selfishly, I won't. I don't want him to get any ideas.
I want my daughter to remember me as the person who made her shriek with terror and delight.
Heather Setka lives in Calgary.
Illustration by Catherine Lepage.