When I was a teenager, PE lessons at school were the bane of my existence. Never the most sporty kid, I had to line up with the rest of my nerd friends and submit to the ritual humiliation of being sorted into teams to play football on a soggy pitch in suburban Nottingham. 

I still remember the twice-weekly ordeal of the changing rooms: this felt like a no-man’s-land where the teachers—for obvious reasons—stayed well away from us, and a bunch of testosterone-addled sociopaths got to run wild for fifteen minutes. You kept your head down and got changed quickly, hoping that the target of abuse that week wouldn’t be you or your mates.

It wasn’t much better once you got out on the field to play. We had two PE teachers in my school: Mr Giles and Mr Mellor. Mr Giles was young, handsome and popular with everyone. Even us nerds looked up to him because he made it seem like with a bit of motivation, even us weirdos talking about Star Wars in the corner could develop a six-pack (or at least manage a few sit-ups). 

Just after I sent out last week’s newsletter, the “Dads ‘n’ Lads” WhatsApp group I’m in sparked into life. Unrelated to my newsletter, one of my close friends shared a Reddit AskMen post with the group to ask for our thoughts on the male loneliness epidemic. Over the course of the weekend, the five of us discussed co-regulation of feelings, the Gottman Method of relationship psychology, and—let’s be real—some ridiculous male-oriented marketing too:

A few days later, I met up with a university friend for lunch and he ended up pouring his heart out about stuff that had clearly been on his mind for a while: family, health, relationships at work and some really challenging circumstances he’s dealing with. It was easily the most personal chat we’d ever had in over fifteen years of friendship and I paused things midway through to offer him a hug (which he accepted). Man feelings!

The next day I was at the barbers for my monthly-ish haircut. It had taken me a while to track it down because it had changed names. Formerly known as “Goodlife”, it’s now called… “Maniac”?

Walking to the train station in Manchester city centre this morning, I saw a little boy of about four years old riding a tiny bike towards me, followed by a dad also on a bike. I smiled to see them, and felt a pang of heartache as I wondered what my own son was doing at that moment – I’m on my way back home after a night in another city for a gig.

As the boy rode past me, his bike tyre skidded on the wet pavement and he toppled off the bike. I turned as soon as I heard him fall, but his dad was on the scene already, slowing his bike to a stop. As I checked to see if the boy was okay, the dad just… stood there on his bike, watching?!

To be clear, the little guy didn’t seem badly hurt, but as I looked over my shoulder trying not to stare, I wondered why the dad wasn't immediately jumping off his bike and running to comfort the boy and pick him up off the sodden ground.

Maybe this was a kind of "tough love" thing the man was experimenting with? Maybe they cycle a lot together and this was a common occurrence, and the boy would quickly be back on two wheels again? Maybe the dad subscribes to that parenting notion that a child looks to you when they hurt themselves to decide how to react (eg. if you make a huge fuss about a minor injury, they'll howl with pain because they feel they're supposed to)?

So last night I went to see Shania Twain. It was my mum’s birthday and she booked the tickets months ago for her partner, my sisters and I to go to a concert together. She reads this newsletter so I’m obliged to say: hello mum! Happy birthday!

But I digress. Shania played her show and finished with the obvious encore: the one-two punch of That Don’t Impress Me Much followed by Man! I Feel Like A Woman.

Man, I felt like… a man. A pretty conspicuous man, really, given that the majority of concertgoers were middle-aged women in cowboy hats. I’ve been in this position only a couple of times in my life – eg. a minority. To be fair, there were still plenty of men at the concert, but quite a few of them looked similar to me and my stepdad – dragged along in attendance by someone else, and trying to look like they were enjoying themselves.

The difficult second newsletter – thanks to all the new subscribers who are interested in hearing about, well, man feelings. Turns out there are at least a few folks who think this is a good idea, which is equal parts encouraging and daunting. On with the issue!

Being a “fixer”

Are you a fixer? Someone who instinctively tries to repair things, I mean. Probably not in a DIY context— although I’m sure those people exist and might even be competent at it—but in the sense of assessing a new situation, deciding you’ve got the measure of it, and trying to step in and sort it out.

This is something I’ve heard frequently from my partner. It’s a fairly well-established cliche now of the oblivious person who immediately attempts to solve someone else’s problem as it’s described to them, instead of just shutting up and listening to it, which is what the other person actually wants. I’d like to think I’m better at this now than I used to be, but I wonder if it’s something that particularly afflicts men, given its close proximity to mansplaining.