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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The Wisdom of a Small Bear

"It was a blustery day in the Hundred Acre Woods". This is what  pops into my head as I lean into the wind, clutching at the collar of my coat to keep the cold air from forcing its way down inside. It pops into my head every time the wind starts to blow and hammer around the house like it did last night. It's from one of my favourite authors, A.A. Milne and his wonderful Winnie the Pooh books. I love Winnie the Pooh, not from the animated movies, as delightful as they are but from the books that I read as a child.  Those lovely, quiet books with their tales of friendship and adventure, and their simple pen and ink drawings by E.H. Shepard of the world of animal friends in the Hundred Acre Woods.

I was an avid reader early on in life and loved to get lost in worlds unlike my own, starting with Dr. Seuss's Cat in the Hat silliness, moving on to Winnie the Pooh and then to the Chronicles of Narnia. My trips to the library were some of my favourite times. My siblings and I were all readers, something my busy mother appreciated, so there were frequent trips to the library to stock up on the books that would keep us occupied and quiet.
The world of Pooh Bear was a perfect one, allowing Pooh to live in the present moment as we are always being told we should do. He had Piglet to worry for him, Eeyore to complain, Owl for wisdom, Rabbit keeping everyone in line,  Kanga to mother him and Tigger to be the wild child. All Pooh had to do was love everyone and be perfectly himself.  Christopher Robin, the little boy to whom Pooh belonged was the only real tie to the human world, a world viewed through the eyes of a child. He was the source of unconditional love for Pooh that I'm sure made Pooh the well-adjusted little bear he was despite being a bear of very little brain.

"When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it"
- A.A. Milne, Winnie-the Pooh

Now if that isn't a profound thought for a small bear, I don't know what is? How many times have you been carrying something inside that seemed so large and heavy but when you talked to someone about it it became quite a different thing, easier to manage, maybe really nothing at all. The world in the Hundred Acre Woods wasn't a childish and bratty world, it was one in which deep thoughts were expressed, the unknown was examined, answers sought and often there was no good resolution to a problem except to eat honey and drink tea until it passed. A good solid plan for most of our problems, I think.

"I am not lost for I know where I am. But however, where I am might be lost."
-A.A. Milne, Winnie -the-Pooh

Many a yoga teacher or self help expert would be happy to have come up with that nugget of truth. Being lost doesn't bother Winnie the Pooh, he trusts in the world of the Hundred Acre Woods to help him find his way back. I need to remember that, it's not me, its just the situation I am in that has the problem.

Kanga and Roo

My lovely mother indulged me and made stuffed animals of some of the characters in the Winnie the Pooh stories. I received a bright yellow Pooh Bear in a small, red jacket, my younger sister got a shiny, pink Piglet, my older sister got the elegant Kanga and Roo, and Eeyore, well, he just hung out and bemoaned the situation. My brother was too old for stuffed animals at that point so Eeyore had to go it alone. But Eeyore understood, that had always been his lot in life.  Of all those stuffed toys only a moth-eaten and ratty Kanga and Roo has remained in my possession. I couldn't throw it away.

 Kanga sits on a shelf next to the animal friends of my sons, keeping up intellectual discussions with the ever thoughtful King Babar the Elephant.  Now there's a leader we could to look to for guidance right now!
And so, I am brought back to the problems of today, both in the world at large and in my own head. The wind continues to bluster, incomprehensible things continue to happen and answers don't seem right at hand but I think of  Pooh Bear and his friends and their simple wisdom and smile. Which on a miserable, wet and colourless day in November might just be the best thing I could do. That and have some tea with honey while I sit back and watch what unfolds.

"When you see someone putting on his Big Boots, you can be pretty sure that an Adventure is going to happen."
- A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh.

My thoughts exactly.