Good Man

Is there anything to be said for being a good man? Last night I sat with a couple of people and a conversation about marriage started. My wife went on and on about what a good guy I am, and how lucky she is to be married to me, etc, etc, etc. In that moment I realized that I have officially been domesticated!

As my wife spoke I began to flash back, and as the memories flooded my brain I was humbled by the reality of who I am. My wife only knows me a man who has learned how to love; she never experienced the man that I was only a couple of years before our marriage. An angry man, a violent man, a manipulator, arrogant, shallow, self-absorbed, and so on.

She never knew me as the man who was paid to intimidate, and physically hurt people. She never knew me as the arrogant young man who went through women like socks. She has never seen the capacity of my rage. My wife knows a man who doesn't speak much anymore and who has learned the value of family, compassion, and a gentle spirit. What she doesn't see is the constant battle with the guilt of my past demons.
I've come to know my demons. I know their names and from time to time they return. They remind me of days filled with activities I used to think made me a man. Things that even to this day are still attractive. I begin to ask questions about my life. I look at the nicely decorated house, the child asleep in the next room, the smell of scented candles in the kitchen, the neatly made beds, and I ask, "What the hell am I doing here?" What happened to the adrenaline of a good fight, the nights of guiltless sex, the mornings of waking up in a strange place? "How did I get here?"
Then it hits me; there's something to be said for being a good man. There's something to be said for reading your child to sleep. There's something to be said for coming home every night. Hell, there's might even be something to be said for scented candles! The reality is it takes twice the man to be a father. It takes twice the man to be a husband.

There's something to be said for being a good man. Tonight I'll go home to a clean house, a beautiful wife, a kid who adores me, and the smell of scented candles. I'll sit down take a cigar from my humidor, sip a screwdriver, and listen to my wife tell me about her day. That's right, I'm domesticated, and even with the little hand soaps in the bathroom, the placemats on the table, the poodle with the bow in his hair, and the freshly pressed shirts in my closet; I still pack a hell of a right hook.