My husband does not watch sports. Not that he is some kind of weenie, mind you. The guy is a stud. He has an Arkansas state football championship ring, in fact (which we recently considered pawning on account of the current value of gold). That said, he had no idea which teams were playing in the last super bowl until we showed up at the super bowl party, snacks in hand.He just has better things to do with his time. I could not be more thrilled.
Our sons, as a result, know nothing about sports. They can swing a bat and throw a football, and they know that a soccer ball is to be kicked into a net, but these things do not define manhood in our home.
What does define manhood for our sons? What they see Daddy doing, of course. Fixing things, building things, and killing animals for food.
So instead of watching football together on the couch, they watch episodes of Man vs. Wild (or rather Men vs. Wild, if you are watching a cheap, pirated copy bought on the street here, which is, sadly, our only choice...and pirates are usually not very good with English).
There they sit, man and sons, as they did this evening, watching Bear Grylls tear open a trapped snow chicken in Iceland, ripping out its innards and pulling free the dark breast meat. They watch as he ties chunks of scavenged sheep to his shoe lace and dangles it into a hot volcanic spring, because cooked meat uses less calories to digest than raw meat. The boys got toy shot guns for Christmas this year, and already they know how to hold their guns vertically whenever they are not being "fired," and to always pass them to another person butt-first. Bright knows the names of the bits on a drill, and if we get on youtube together, he wants to watch construction footage or how-to woodworking classes, like how to build a birdhouse.
Some guys are devoted sports fans, others play video games, many are both. My guys are neither. But if you came across a snake in the woods, or had a leaky roof, you'd be glad to have guys like mine around:)
