(I wrote this a while ago. I found it today and reread it. I made some changes to some things, and essentially updated it.)
Maybe I have had too much time over the past five to six years to chip away at what I believe it means to be a man. Maybe being in college has helped this viewpoint progress at a quicker rate, as well, but then again, if there is one place to see what to do, and not to do, as a male, it is probably at a New Jersey college.
This is a sporadic writing, and I am writing this because I want to. After all, that is why this blog is here to begin with, no? And frankly, this has been something I have wanted to write for a while.
Too many guys grow up nowadays thinking that to be a real guy, you need to be ripped out of your mind or slay through girls as if you are, as comedian Daniel Tosh helped me to label, the one Spartan fighting off massive hordes of Persian hookers. Maybe it is the idea that you need to be tough, and be able to take a hit. Maybe it is the belief that no emotion equals no flaws, making you the ideal man who can stone face any problem that stares you right back down. Maybe it was the father who worked in trucking his whole life, or the mechanic dad who has a hard exterior that forces the next of kin to grow up with that shell of armor.
Either way, I have prided myself on developing my own views for what it means to be man; what it means to be me. I grew up in a strict household, but I was not forced down a path to grow up. The only thing, indeed, which was forced upon me, was a sense of respect for those above you, and the ability to maintain a level head, and a sense of manners. So that is where I will begin:
