I am a man, 51 years old.
I was a babe, a babe born with a penis and testicles, my little twig and berries. I am a son and a brother.
As a boy I did not always enjoy this fact that I was a boy; girls were pretty, not so gross and mean. I wasn't like other little boys who punched me, buried me in sand, sat on me. My twin saved me and we escaped to our own world for a time.
Boys and men can be true brutes, their clever hands and simple minds responsible for much evil and suffering.
As a boy I was spanked by my father, my teachers, my coaches, my school principals. The coaches left marks. It wasn't so bad, hurt pride and ego more than anything.
Men kill, rape, and murder innocents more frequently than women do, and more easily. Some men can be base and brute. I do my best not to be one.
But don't tell me to understand you, think like you, or be like you. I am not you. You be you.
Don't tell me to take a pronoun of my choice. What's my pronoun? You know already.
I am a man.
I am a loving husband, and a loving father. I was a boy. Maybe I will become an old man, shriveled, bent and dried up. I have a penis, piddle pipe, wiener, john thomas, johnson, dick, trouser snake, cock. If I become very old I guess it will just be a forgotten, useless little thing. I have only entered into physical union with my wife. Despite our naked passion I used restraint before marriage, was as gentle as she asked after.
I am not a brute. I have raised my voice, yes, and screamed. I have thrown household objects at walls. I did spank my older daughter. It was not hard, left no visible marks. Three times. The last was many years ago because each time it accomplished nothing but hurt. I never thought to spank my younger daughter. I evolved.
I am a man.
I cannot fathom the actions of some men. I don't call women foul names, make a tally of women I've laid, brag about making women squirt. I don't stay out late to come home drunk. I don't know why some men horribly beat the women or children they say they love. I don't stick my finger up my ass then in someone's mouth and laugh. I don't throw turtles in the air to watch them explode as they hit pavement. I don't kill sheep with glee because a gun is handy.
I was a boy. I was bullied by other boys. As a boy I learned to fight back. As a teenage boy I bullied. Finally I chased another teenage boy with a gang of teenage boys, cornered that boy on a rooftop. The gang yelled kick his ass, break his nose, and the man in the house came out and shouted firmly to leave the boy alone, go home, we were shameful.
My father and my mother both taught me to be kind and work hard. My father taught me to save and be thrifty, my mother to give and be generous. They showed me love as my parents and showed me how a man and woman love and respect one another as a husband and a wife.
I am a man.
I love quiet walks, sunsets, clouds, and the stillness of the dawn. I feel good with hard work and hard runs. I commune with the moon and talk to animals. I hate spiders and place them respectfully outside. The sound of pencil and pen drawing on paper makes me smile. My hands are not clever. Still, I can fix a few things. I try to clean my fingernails and scrub my hands before eating, tickling my kids, caressing my wife. Sometimes I shave.
Do not tell me I am the problem, the privileged, the colonizer. You don't know me.
Do not call me a chauvinist, an oppressor. Do not tell me I am a brute. That was not my last fight but it was the last time I bullied.
My male anatomy is a scientific truth, and also millennia of human tradition and belief Belief in the importance of boys learning to become men, men learning to become fathers, providers, and protectors, men growing old who with time maybe find wisdom to share with men, boys, families, communities.
I try to teach my daughters about boys and men, and also how to become women, as best as I can.
I am a man.
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