Want To Know About The Other Sex? Pick Up Their Magazines

A typical cover for Men's
Health

It started out innocuously enough.  I had purchased a subscription to Men's Health magazine for my husband as he was working out regularly and I thought he might enjoy it. He barely glanced at it. This was back in the day when you actually bought physical magazines and had them delivered to your house.  My ingrained thriftiness wouldn't allow me to let the magazine go unread every month, I would get my money's worth out of it, so I picked it up and started to read. Since I worked out at the gym twice a week I thought that the information the magazine was giving out might just as well pertain to me.
My world at the time was very estrogen heavy, filled with other stay-at-home moms raising their kids. While it was comforting to share what I was experiencing with my female friends who were doing the same thing it could get a bit.... boring. And then along came Men's Health magazine. Bam! I was hooked. Opening the cover was opening the door to another world. A testosterone filled one. The writing was sharp and punchy, even aggressive. A "kick in the pants" style telling men to get off the couch, work out, cook something healthy, dress better, do some personal grooming and how they could please a woman in bed.  They were speaking my language.

I had had enough of women's magazines showing me how to stay young and sexy to delight my husband while raising brilliant children in an impeccable home. I was more than ready for another point of view.  Raising two boys and married to a man, this stuff was relevant for me. Soon I was picking up GC and Esquire to round out the picture and everyone just assumed my husband was the one who read them. The inner workings of the male body, and the male mind, why wouldn't this appeal? The writing was so good, funny and direct. Interviews with well known athletes, movie stars, politicians, and writers; coverage of scandals and crimes; medical breakthroughs and great nutritional advice, fashion and grooming ...it was all there, but with a male slant. Written by men for men. I became a better gift giver for the men in my life, got styling tips on keeping my husband well-dressed and I found out what was a turn off and turn on for men sexually, at least according to the magazines. I learnt about making classic cocktails, how to get six pack abs and that vexing question of whether to match your sock colour to your shoe or pant (answer:pant).  And the pictures! What's not to like about well-muscled, handsome men in spandex doing push ups? Or one wearing a $3000 suit, glancing at a $10,000 watch.

It was reassuring to see that the media was pushing a physical ideal on men that was just as out of reach for most of the population as the one that the women's magazines were pushing on me. I knew these male models were clocking many hours in the gym every week and living off of chicken breasts and celery sticks to maintain their 42 inch chests and 29 inch waists. I appreciated every ounce of their effort. And, I could follow their work out regime as published in the magazine to try and attain those abs for myself! What's not to love?

Eye candy aside it was the topics and the writing that kept me reading. Advances in prostate cancer research, new information on cardiac health, how men feel about their father and being a father. It was all great stuff and not what was being discussed with the moms at the school playground. It was truly an alternate universe for me that helped me to better care for and understand my husband and sons in ways that Good Housekeeping or Vogue could not.
Eventually though the bloom came off the rose. Just as with other magazines the stories became repetitive. There are only so many ways to pump up a bicep or make a steak salad or groom your facial hair. The subscription got canceled and I now only rarely look at Esquire on my iPad but I have nothing but fond memories of my journey through the world of men's publishing. I like to think it gave my little universe a bit of balance at a time when I felt I was drowning in ways to decorate my table for Easter.  Perhaps in this outraged #metoo world it might do men some good to pick up a few magazines aimed at women and give them a read. You never know what understanding may lay beyond that door.

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