Asked
Are Men Just Big Children?
For those who often wonder why the average family is 1.5 children hat: Half of the man is counted. Our columnist thinks it’s mean.
The lights go out above Mike. A well-aimed kick at the street lamp and it got dark. “Do you remember”, he says and moves like Karate-Kid, “we used to darken half a part of the city in one fell swoop!” Memories come back, confetti behind my forehead. Where is the next lantern?
“Grow up!”
Immediately get thwarted by a verbal speed threshold. Mike’s wife. “Grow up!” says Anne and shakes her head. Want to think about the sentence, really, but I’m distracted by Mike’s armpit farts. If looks could kill.
Mike used to be her cute slob. A rebellious, anarchist, unconventional man she fell in love with faster than he could steal a Mercedes star from her. Today he’s a silly kid to her. What has changed in the meantime? Nothing with him!
Mike and I, we need the silly against the sadness of everyday life, against boredom and premature aging. Enthusiasm for what is playful keeps us alive. The brain passes the baton to the heart. We then think less, feel more. With the children in us. And those on our laps.
In the past, fathers were the ones mothers threatened their children with if they had done something wrong. Strict authorities with the corners of their mouths drooping lower than their children’s heads at some point did. Men who were so serious they were called that too. Or Hartmut, Gerhart, Siegfried.
Be an adult AND have fun
“Peter Pan Syndrome,” Anne screeches now. Guys who never want to grow up. But the truth is: it’s the other way around. We always wanted to be grown up. We just never lost the fun on the way there.
Perhaps Anne is one of those women who already imagined their spiritual maturity at the age of eleven and who later discussed with their BFFs in the smokers’ corner how they would be later as mothers. While Mike sucked ahoy shower through his nose and snapped booger at window panes. At times she was silly. But girls often cross the bridge from childhood to adulthood faster than boys. Why do they look back so seldom?
The lantern flickers, it is getting light again. Only Anne’s shading continues. We who waved our arms around wildly are now doing nothing. Until we can show ourselves in a different light again.