EM: Life and love can make people crazy.

By EM RUSCIANO

“Wife’s crazy ninja attack on hubby”.

If there was a service that designed personalised headlines, then I would assume this would have been amongst their finest work.

Urban ninjas are my passion and to think that there may have been costuming and fly kicks involved in this wife/husband situation was almost too much for me to handle.

The headline also made me concerned that someone had been reading my inner thoughts because goodness knows that headline could apply to me…

What?! I wouldn’t actually attack him of course but dressing up as a ninja and scaring him a bit is okay right?!

Suffice to say, I couldn’t click on the link fast enough and I then cursed the government for not having their crap together on the NBN, as I waited the 3 seconds for the page to load.

And then, there she was.

“Infamous baseball wife” Anna Benson. (I sincerely hope that is written on her business cards. And on a side note, which kind of infamous wife would you like to be?! I’ve got dibs on “Infamous Magician’s wife Em Rusciano”).

Back to the story. Let me give you some background and just know that by the end of this you – like I – will want to hold Anna and whisper that everything is going to be alright… TRUST ME.

Anna is a mother of four, a former “exotic dancer” and “glamour model” and star of the now defunct “Major League Baseball Wives” television program. Anna was married to former Mets pitcher (baseball people… baseball) Kris Benson. They met at the strip club Anna was working at at the time and bonded over a lap dance.

Who says romance is dead?

Anna once said in an interview: “I told Kris, cheat on me all you want. If you get caught, I’m gonna screw everybody on your entire team.” Interesting fidelity insurance tactic. I’m not sure who the winners and losers would be in that situation. It’s not something any of us should think too hard about… Anna is QUITE the go getter no?!

Yesterday though I.B.W Anna Benson was not a happy camper.

Anna broke into her former husband‘s mansion, wearing a bullet proof vest and fully loaded ammo belt. Anna was armed with a gun, taser, expanding metal baton and a hatchet. It’s like she walked into her local weapons shop and said “I’ll have one of everything please!”

Anna then demanded $30,000 in cash. Kris, the ex, was understandably concerned. He told Anna that he was just going to nick down to the shop to get the money but what he really did… was call the police.

So then the po po arrived and found Anna sitting on the back veranda smoking a cigarette. She didn’t resist arrest, she even told them where she’d put all her weapons down and peacefully left with them.

Anna did offer up an explanation as to why she was dressed like Rocky AND Rambo, she said: “I was testing the bullet proof vest for a company, they needed it to mould to my body”.

Okay, she probably should have work-shopped that one a little more… but it COULD have been true.

The thing is friends, that after taking in this information, I thought “there but for the grace of God go I. I get this. I get her”.

After reading the story a lot of people will point and stare at Anna but I reckon secretly, in their heart of hearts, may relate to her a little bit. I don’t know about you but I find something mesmerising about raw, authentic, unhinged public shit losing.

Most of us are too paralysed by the fear of judgement of others to show authentic emotion in a public forum.

I wonder if it’s a freeing experience?

I’m not condoning the violence, she was heavily armed and obviously in a very bad place mentally. But I still feel for Anna Benson. Her ex-husband, for whatever reason, had pushed her too far. She is the mother of his children, perhaps he had been ignoring her phone calls and emails and she felt this was the only way to get his attention?

I’ve been a woman on the brink a few times this year.

You know what I mean right? That wildness that can take you over. Life and love can drive normal people to abnormal behaviour. Like that of a mother of 4, donning full army attire, breaking into her ex-husband’s house armed with all the weapons and demanding thousands of dollars for her efforts.

This tale has taught me the great lesson of empathy. And I never thought a civilian lady Ninja slash former exotic dancer could do that. I’ll leave you with Anna’s mug shot: it could be any of us.

Look at those harassed eyes, I have those eyes – on a daily basis.

Em Rusciano regularly appears on Network Ten’s ’The Project’. You can follow her on Twitter here and take a look at her website here.

You can also find her Facebook page here.

Tickets to the awesome show Em performed at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, “Puberty, Rhythm & Blues”  are now on sale for upcoming performances at The Factory Theatre in Sydney.

You can get your hands on them *and you should) right here.