Real Men Don T Cry Mostly

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Good evening, and welcome to the programme. I'm Penelope Hartwell. Tonight we ask a question that has filled a great many think pieces and very few therapy appointments: is modern masculinity in crisis?

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: With me are two men who have, I'm told, very different views on the subject. Bill is a retired union steward from Ohio. Bill, welcome.

Boomer Bill: Thanks. Short answer, yes. Long answer, also yes.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: And joining us from a pub in Dublin, where he insisted on recording, Arthur Sullivan.

Arthur: Penelope. Penny. Can I call you Penny? I'm going to call you Penny, and I want you to know that is a sign of tremendous respect.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Penelope is fine. Bill, let's start with you. What's gone wrong?

Boomer Bill: Men forgot how to be men. Simple.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Could you be slightly less simple?

Boomer Bill: Back in my day, a man fixed his own car. Paid his bills. Didn't talk about his feelings at the dinner table. Now they got men crying in commercials.

Arthur: Ah, now, hang on, hang on. What's wrong with a man crying? I cried this morning.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: May I ask why?

Arthur: Someone at the bus stop gave me half a sausage roll. Didn't know me from Adam. Just handed it over. Penelope, I've not recovered.

Boomer Bill: See, that's what I'm talking about.

Arthur: A sausage roll, Bill! From a stranger! If that doesn't move you, there's a hole where your heart should be, and I say that as your friend.

Boomer Bill: We just met.

Arthur: And already I'd take a bullet for you. That's the Irish way.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Bill, you said men shouldn't cry. When was the last time you cried?

Boomer Bill: Nineteen seventy-nine.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: That's very specific.

Boomer Bill: Plant closed. Then Pete Rose got old. Rough year.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So men do cry, but only about factories and baseball.

Boomer Bill: About things that matter. Not sausage rolls.

Arthur: The sausage roll mattered to me, Bill. Don't you take that from me.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Let's move to something the research does take seriously. Surveys suggest a lot of men report having no close friends at all. Bill, how many close friends do you have?

Boomer Bill: Define close.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Someone you could ring at two in the morning if something was wrong.

Boomer Bill: Why would I call anybody at two in the morning? I'd handle it.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Handle what, exactly?

Boomer Bill: Whatever it is. Furnace, flat tire, raccoon. You handle it.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: And if the problem were, say, loneliness?

Boomer Bill: I got a dog.

Arthur: I've got loads of friends. Loads. There's Declan, there's Big Declan, there's the other Declan, who we don't talk about.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Why don't you talk about the other Declan?

Arthur: Twenty eleven. A dispute over a darts trophy. He knows what he did. Hic. Sorry, Penny. Penelope. Sorry.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So you have friends. But do you talk to them about anything serious?

Arthur: Constantly. Only last night Big Declan told me his marriage is in trouble and I held his hand for an hour. Two grown men. Holding hands at the bar. And then we sang.

Boomer Bill: That's not a crisis, that's a musical.

Arthur: And what's wrong with a musical? Do you know what's in a musical, Bill? Everything. Love. Death. A lad in a hat.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Bill, do you think a little more of that might help men?

Boomer Bill: Holding hands at a bar? No.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Talking about a marriage in trouble.

Boomer Bill: Maybe. Quietly. In a truck.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: In a truck.

Boomer Bill: You're both looking forward. Nobody has to make eye contact. That's how my old man and me talked. Best conversations of my life, staring at the road.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: That's rather lovely, actually.

Boomer Bill: Don't make it a thing.

Arthur: Bill. Bill. That's the most beautiful thing I've ever heard. Your father and you, in the truck. I've got to step away for a second.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Arthur, you're still talking.

Arthur: I'm stepping away emotionally, Penelope. My body is here. My heart is in Ohio, in that truck.

Boomer Bill: Fine. He can come in the truck.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Let's talk about practical skills. Bill, you mentioned men used to fix their own cars. Is that part of masculinity, or just part of owning a car in nineteen seventy?

Boomer Bill: Both. A man ought to know how to change a tire. Unclog a drain. Shoot a deer.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Do you shoot deer?

Boomer Bill: No. Knees. But I could.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So the important thing is knowing you could.

Boomer Bill: Exactly. Kids today can't even read a map. Phone tells 'em turn left, they turn left. Into a lake, if it says so.

Arthur: I can't read a map either and I'm the most manly man in this pub. Ask anyone. Ask Siobhan behind the bar. Siobhan! She's ignoring me. She does that when she loves you.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Arthur, what makes you the most manly man in the pub?

Arthur: I once carried a fridge up four flights of stairs for a woman I'd never met.

Boomer Bill: Okay. That's something.

Arthur: It was the wrong flat. She hadn't ordered a fridge. But Bill, I carried it, and that's the point. Then I carried it back down. Twice the man.

Boomer Bill: I'll give him the fridge.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Let me press you both on role models. Who taught you what a man is supposed to be?

Boomer Bill: My father. Worked thirty-one years at the mill. Never missed a day.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Did he ever tell you he loved you?

Boomer Bill: He fixed my bike.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: That isn't quite what I asked.

Boomer Bill: Yes it is.

Arthur: My da was a great man. A great man. He could whistle with two fingers so loud the dogs came from the next parish. Where was I going with this.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Role models.

Arthur: Right. My da. He told me every night, Arthur, you're a good lad, don't let anyone say otherwise. And loads of people said otherwise. Teachers. Guards. Two of the Declans. But I had his voice in my head.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So one father fixed the bike and one father said the words.

Boomer Bill: Same thing.

Arthur: It is the same thing, Penny, he's right. The bike is the words, Bill. The bike is the words.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: I'm not sure either of you has actually agreed with the other, but you both seem very happy about it.

Boomer Bill: What I'm saying is a man shows it. He doesn't announce it.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Bill, earlier you said men today are soft because they talk about feelings. But you've just described your best memories as talking to your father in a truck, and your father showing love through a bicycle.

Boomer Bill: So?

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So it sounds as if you think men should express feelings, just in a sort of mechanical code.

Boomer Bill: That's not soft. That's efficient.

Arthur: Efficient love. Write that down. That's going on a tea towel.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Let's look at the pub, then. Arthur, is the pub where Irish men go to be vulnerable?

Arthur: The pub is a church, Penelope, with worse singing. Better singing. Depends on the night. You come in, you say how are you, the lad says grand, and you both know he's not grand.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: And then what?

Arthur: Then you buy him a pint and you don't ask. And in about four pints he tells you. Sometimes five. Big Declan's a six.

Boomer Bill: That's the truck. Same as the truck.

Arthur: It is the truck! Bill, the pub is your truck! I knew it. I knew we were brothers.

Boomer Bill: Don't call me brother.

Arthur: Cousins, then.

Boomer Bill: Fine.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So, as we near the end, is masculinity in crisis? Bill?

Boomer Bill: Yes. Men need to toughen up. Change a tire. Show up for work.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: And talk to their friends?

Boomer Bill: In the truck. Sure.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: Arthur?

Arthur: No crisis. No crisis at all. A man is someone who carries a fridge up the stairs, cries over a sausage roll, and forgives the other Declan. I haven't forgiven the other Declan. But a man would.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: That's quite a definition.

Arthur: I love you both. I mean that. Bill, if you're ever in Dublin, you come to this pub, and I'll show you the fridge.

Boomer Bill: You still have it?

Arthur: Somebody had to take it, Bill.

Dr. Penelope Hartwell: So there we have it. Masculinity may or may not be in crisis, but it appears to be alive and well in trucks, in pubs, and in at least one unclaimed fridge. I'm Penelope Hartwell. Do ring a friend tonight, preferably before two in the morning. Good night.