As you all can guess, Kim and I, along with the whole of the wrestling world, were completely blindsided last night with the news of the death of WWE Superstar Chris Benoit and his wife and child.
It has only gotten worse since the initial shock with the news that authorities in the Atlanta area investigating the situation now firmly believe that it was a double murder-suicide, and that Benoit murdered his wife Nancy, known to wrestling fans worldwide as legendary manager Woman, on Saturday, and their 7 year old son Daniel on Sunday, and then killed himself Monday.
Chris had been scheduled to wrestle CM Punk at Sunday's Vengeance PPV, but called WWE officials on Saturday and said he couldn't make it due to a "personal emergency".
When we first got the news, flipping into last nights WWE Raw about 10 minutes into the show, and heard that his whole family was dead, I instinctively knew that a whole family dead added to "personal emergency" would most likely mean it was a murder-suicide situation. I didn't want to believe it, though - I COULDN'T BELIEVE IT - and with news trickling in about the police investigating it as a homicide, I thought I was overreacting and put it out of my mind. But just as we were going to bed, at 10:58 PM ET, Fox News' Greta Von Susteren broke the news about that aspect of what was happening, and I just dissolved into tears, and so did Kim - and we'd held up well most of the rest of the evening.
What the HELL Happened?
Here was a man that by all accounts was the most respected, most cherished wrestler of his generation, a product of the Hart Family Dungeon training school. He was worshipped by fans worldwide as the most perfect and pure technical wrestler of the past 15 years. He worked his way through the ranks, his skills, his drive, and his respect for his chosen profession serving to make him someone who was respected by his peers as well as the fans. He had served the fans well, and truly made himself worthy of the title "legend in his own time" during the years he spent with ECW, WCW, and finally, WWE. His name was destined to be revered throughout the years and even now was already often mentioned with other legends like Lou Thesz, Harley Race, and Ricky Steamboat.
All of that has been wiped out in one fell swoop.
He will now likely be reviled as a hero who fell and who rather than face whatever problems there were on the horizon, deliberately chose to take the lives of those people he professed to love and then take his own life.
He will likely be forever branded a coward for that action. Does he deserve to be? Only his individual friends and fans can decide that for themselves.
I will never forget watching him lose it on camera when Eddie Guerrero died. His emotions spilled out, and he didn't care who saw him weeping over the loss of the man that all wrestling fans knew was his best friend.
What would Eddie think of you now, Chris?
Obviously there were problems that the fans didn't know about. And it sounded like none of his fellow wrestlers knew about them either. Maybe in the weeks and months ahead, some sense will be made of what happened. Maybe something will come out that will comfort his closest associates, and the millions of fans who literally threw themselves at Benoit's feet screaming "We're Not Worthy" whenever he was on-screen.
Maybe. Or maybe not. Maybe we'll NEVER make any sense of it. Which is actually the most likely scenario.
Right now, I am just so confused. I don't understand why he would do this. I don't understand how he could have killed his own wife, and especially, his own 7-year-old son.
I don't understand how someone who knew he was worshipped by millions of fans, and who always acknowledged and respected his fans (something else you rarely find among most wrestlers these days) could forget what this would do to them, how it would devastate them.
I just don't understand why.
There's a scene near the end of my all time favorite movie, the Zhang Yimou film HERO, that sums up my emotions right, now and probably millions of others as well - the sight of Flying Snow screaming in anguish having just inadvertently killed the love of her life, Broken Sword. Only in this case, rather than being run through by his lover, it looks like Benoit has fallen on his own sword...
And so, I’ll do all I know how to do to deal with this situation...ask the one question that millions of people are asking right now...
WHY, CHRIS, WHY?
Shelley Winters, the forceful, outspoken star who graduated from blond bombshell parts to dramas, winning Academy Awards as supporting actress in "The Diary of Anne Frank" and "A Patch of Blue," has died. She was 85. Winters died of heart failure early Saturday at The Rehabilitation Centre of Beverly Hills, her publicist Dale Olson said. She had been hospitalized in October after suffering a heart attack. 
