CONFIDENT MEN ON THEIR SPECIAL DAYS

Confident men gain more confidence at each milestone.

Eventually some become over-confident men.

It’s gets worse in middle-aged men and settles into the murky waters of wtf in senior men.

That’s a picture of the seniors on their football team. Not the same senior as old guys.

Building confident men starts early.

At the age of thirteen, boys have finally shaken off the little boy label.

At thirteen they are by God teenagers.

Now they’ve got the license to rebel, make some noise, cause some trouble good and bad.

Some go for it, some conform to the family rules.

I personally broke out, broke curfew, lied about where I was, and got grounded the rest of the summer.

Was it worth it? One of my Dad’s jobs in the Marine Corps after he ran the ridges of the Korean War was running the jail on a ship called the USS Boxer. He knew a few things about handling renegade personnel.

The whole learning experience of what a mom and dad do with a moody kid was worth it.

And I wasn’t that moody, just chafed at how unfair everything was.

Sound teenaged enough?

Driver’s License Day

If kids are on schedule, and competitive, they get their driver’s license on their 16th birthday.

That’s after a year of driving with a mom or dad in the car giving instructions.

My Mom was a DMV career lady who knew something about motor vehicles.

She also knew early that she didn’t want to drive around with a kid who looked down at the stick when he shifted. My dad was an insurance adjuster who knew the risks and still had patience.

One the guys had a friend with a truck and invited me to cruise one weekend night.

We all gave a dollar for gas to cruise the gut in Coos Bay since North Bend didn’t have one.

But that’s not what happened. For them cruising meant finding an open stretch of highway out of town and gunning the truck up to 100mph. A fast cruiser, but still a truck, a work truck.

It’s frightening to think back on, and it was frightening then. Maybe I wasn’t a cruiser?

Confident Men At 18 And Up

That’s a bunch of 18 year olds in the top picture.

It was 1973. We were grown men with the right to vote since 1971. And the draft had ended.

Later in the year it was time to graduate from high school. We either went to college, got jobs, went into the service, or got married.

All were mature choices that made for more confident men. Some even got it right.

Getting to twenty-one opened a big door: Now we didn’t need fake I.D. We could walk into any liquor store, any bar, and tavern, and say, “I’ll have the regular,” whatever that might be.

(It was Olympia or Blitz.)

By thirty most of us knew how to tie a tie and not feel like a clown wearing one. It was a milestone. Why not wear a shirt and tie like a confident man?

Make it, or fake it, no one knew the difference, but that shirt and tie was a clue.

The Problem With Confident Men

After sharp older men were groomed in their younger day, they learned to spot people as vulnerable as they had been.

How many aging boomers like yours truly have had The Conversation when they were younger?

“Son, it’s a hard world out there and you need to be prepared. You’re not a kid anymore. Poor choices don’t end up on a juvenile record that gets excused by your youth. Now, you make a big mistake, you pay the big price.

“When you take chances, balance the results you want with how you approach the problem. Do you have the education and experience for a good result? The resources to start over if you fail?

“What I’m offering is an opportunity you can’t find anywhere. I can teach you everything I know so you can take things further than I have. All I’m asking for is your complete devotion, loyalty, and understanding.

“What I’ll show you may look like some lowdown, bottom crawling advice on how to lie, cheat, and steal, but like I said, it’s a hard world.

“First ask yourself, have you ever been lied to, cheated on, and stolen from? In terms of which side do want to be on, that’s the wrong side. It’s better to initiate than be initiated on.

“While I may look like a liar, cheater, and thief, don’t believe what your eyes see, and what your ears hear. Do we understand each other?

“Now I’m going to give you a number to call, and I want you to call it after we finish.”

Would you make that call? Confident men want to know.