Author Matthew Heneghan

Hulk Hogan died today. Seventy-one years young. It’s really not that old when you measure in terms of life. Or, in his case, larger than life.

Yes, I am aware of the controversies that arose in later years for Hogan. I am not here to ignore all that — I am just not here to speak on it. There’s a difference.

No, that’s not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about me.

I know… shocker.

For many 80’s and 90’s kids, a common thread shared between us, was a love of the Hulkster. Wrestling legend. Pop culture icon. Human cartoon with a handlebar mustache and biceps that belonged in the pages of comic book.

I felt sad when I heard the news today. Not the kind of sadness that is reserved for someone you know — but a strange pang of solemnity that comes from learning that another piece of our youth and the idealism it was wrapped in has faded away. Like a rug being pulled beneath the feet of time, it plays on our senses and thoughts of what we once knew to be sure.

I was a kid in the early 90s. A time before streaming, before smartphones, before cynicism hit the bloodstream. And on those sacred Saturday mornings, Hulk Hogan was the closest thing we had to a real-life superhero. Positivity in bright spandex and sweat.

Whatcha gonna do, brother?

A towering human with bleach blonde hair. Skin the color of a hot dog left on the grill for just a little too long. Yellow tights that looked like they were forged in sunlight. And a voice that growled with goodness. That man didn’t just walk into a wrestling ring — he was born into it, like Thor with a steel chair. The God of technicolour and baby oil.

There was nothing quite like it. I’d wake up earlier than I ever did for school. Fumble through kitchen cupboards for a bowl, maybe scrape together the tail end of three different cereals. I’d hear the snap of the TV turning on before the sound even kicked in. And then… there he was. Hulk Hogan. Larger than life. Full of fire and positivity and righteous rage. The bandana, the popping veins, the way he almost spoke just to me… or to you… it was a snapshot in time. One I have revisited since hearing the news.

“Take your vitamins. Say your prayers. Eat your cereal. And if someone’s being a bully? Drop the leg and move on, brother.”

Simple. Honest. Loud.

A credo we could all get behind.

A sign of simpler times, maybe?

I didn’t know about steroids or lawsuits or backstage drama. I didn’t care. To me, Hulk Hogan wasn’t just a man — he was zenith. The forever good guy. He was heroism in spandex. He was a moral compass with a feather boa. He was the voice in my head that stood up to bullies when I didn’t yet know how.

When I’d come home from school and some kid had been a dick, I’d go to my room, open the lid to my toy box, pull out the stylized plastic replica of the Hulkster, and we’d battle the douche bags of the world right there on the small rug in my room. A tag-team that never quite made it to Saturday Night’s Main Event television.

We lose a lot as we grow up. Some of it we choose to forget: Broken hearts, bad haircuts, brutal math teachers.

But some stuff gets taken from us slowly, piece by piece, like sand slipping through your fingers. And today, with Hogan gone, I felt another grain fall. A granule of boyhood surrendered to the whim of passing time.

The world doesn’t make guys like Hulk Hogan anymore. Hell, it barely makes Saturday mornings. I can’t recall the last time I sat quiet on a Saturday morning and just bathed in the innocence of a moment.

And maybe that’s what hurts most. Because my mourning Hogan isn’t just about losing a man — it’s about losing what he represented. It’s about saying goodbye to a simpler time when good guys flexed, bad guys sneered, and the lines between the two were as bright as his goddamn shirt he used to rip off his back.

I’m not saying the guy was perfect. None of them are. Neither are we. I’m saying he mattered. To a lot of us. And to the boy version of me — sitting cross-legged on the carpet, covered in cereal dust and belief — he was everything. He picked up Andre the Giant for crying out loud!

So today, I raise a spoonful of stale cereal to the Hulkster. Thanks for the leg drops. Thanks for the lessons. And thanks for giving us a reason to believe in heroes — even if only for twenty minutes on a Saturday morning.

Oh, and thanks for reminding me to eat my vitamins; that little tip has come in quite handy this late in life. My knees thank you.

Whatcha gonna do, brother… when the memories run wild on you?

Rest easy, champ.