Moving to the Music: Wrestling Past Limitations

When most wrestlers step onto the mat, they think about the technical components of the match — the quickest way to grab a leg, get a turn or pin their opponent’s shoulder blades to the ground. For Alvin “AJ” Buckley Jr., he’s thinking about one thing: the song “Spanish Joint” by D'Angelo.

At the beginning of the wrestling season, Buckley was the sole athlete on his high school team. Early-season practices would often consist of Buckley, his coach, and a friend he could convince to be a drill partner for takedowns, throws and pins in a padded practice room no bigger than a two-stall garage.

Buckley transferred to the Mississippi School for the Blind after his genetic eye disease, Retinitis Pigmentosa, started to affect his learning. The disease is a form of night blindness that can develop into tunnel vision later in life, meaning his peripheral vision could diminish. He retains some sight.

With time, Buckley became comfortable with the change in schools allowing him to come out of his shell.

“I never looked at my disability as a problem, because if I can see something, I can see it, if I don’t, I don’t,” Buckley said.

Since seventh grade, he has qualified for state wrestling multiple times and learned to play six instruments — trumpet, trombone, saxophone, baritone, piano and drums as he finishes up his junior year.

Music gives Buckley a sense of focus and energy unique to him while, quite literally, providing a rhythm where he can improvise his wrestling moves like live music.

“That’s how AJ’s mind works, so this kid, in his mind, he’s writing the soundtrack to his life,” Kimble Funchess, the band director at MSB, said

Photos and story by Ayrton Breckenridge

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