Dusty Rhodes represented the people, the 'American Dream'

On June 11, 2015, the world became a little less joyful.

On this day Dusty Rhodes, born Virgil Runnels, died at the age of 69.

When Rhodes took his final breath and left the world of the living, we lost more than just a legendary wrestler. We lost a man that brought people of all walks of life together as one.

Like his theme song said, it didn't matter if you were black or white or redneck funky. That was all right.

People got Dusty Rhodes, and people didn't care that a pot-bellied white man from Texas with the voice of an African American Baptist preacher was the embodiment of the so-called "American Dream." He took people for a ride and everyone went along with him.

No questions were asked, and despite his most famous speech was about hard times, only good times were had.

Rhodes won matches and titles and made a lot of money, but the reason people took that journey with him was because he spoke for them. When he spoke, people listened. When he spoke, people were captivated.

He spoke for you. Yes, you — that average person working hard to provide for their families, to put food on the table, to get by.

He spoke to you. He literally reached out into the audience and told them to grab his hand and take the journey with him. Where would that journey end up? No one cared. All people knew was that "Big Dust" was going to take them there, and if he was there everything was going to be just fine. The "Dream" wasn't going to let them down. He never did.

He spoke like you. Sure, a jive-talking white man wasn't necessarily the norm, but everyone knew someone that talked like that. That person was your neighbor. He was your relative. He was your colleague.

Whatever the case may have been, you knew Rhodes even if you never even met him.

He looked like you. Now, I'm not saying that everyone has curly blonde hair and a beer gut, but if a guy that looked like that could hang with the likes of Ric Flair and Nikita Koloff, it gave you hope that maybe you could, too.

At the end of the day, he was you. Everyone has a piece of him woven into his or her fabric.

When he was on the television screen, people weren't watching a super athlete they couldn't relate to. They were watching themselves in the ring dropping bionic elbows, swinging their hips, bragging about dining with kings and queens and sitting in alleyways eating pork and beans.

The best part was, he was having as much fun as we were. His smile, his emotion, his energy was real. It was authentic.

His love for wrestling was passed down to his sons Dustin and Cody, who have made names for themselves in the WWE as a result.

Yes, he was a common man, but the mark he left, the trail he blazed on the wrestling business was anything but.

Even after the days of him speaking for himself were long gone, he still spoke, but through others, as he helped cultivate dozens upon dozens of wrestlers find themselves in the industry.

But as much as he could teach others what it took to captivate fans, no one could ever match the way he did it. It wasn't possible.

The so-called American dream is supposed to be about white picket fences, financial stability and apple pie.

But it really isn't that at all. It's about Dusty Rhodes and people just like him — people that don't take no for an answer, people that stand by their word and their principles, people that stand up for what's right and against what's wrong.

It's about a man fighting for more than just himself, but for everyone.

Rhodes may have died on June 11, 2015, but that American dream will live on forever.