When I was young,
I once asked myselfwhat makes a man? I asked my grandfather:a cancer-infested, bigoted war heroin the care of the state. “Put a gun in your hand, and serve your goddamned country.”“You’re a generation of COWARDS and PUSSIES. Just you wait--The Chinese, the Arabs--and the MEXICANS!--Well, you take my word, it’s US or THEM!” I asked my father, who was settled comfortably withan upper-middle class home, a second wife,general anxiety disorder and type-two diabetes.  “You better snap out of it and PAY ATTENTION,”he said in between swallows of pills from his morning medical cocktail.“For you and your little buddies it’s going to be harder than ever to get a good job, you better start acting like an ADULT and grow up.” Lastly my brother told me(although I didn’t ask him).Recently evicted by his landlord,the latest episode in a series of his life’s unfair travesties. “IN-DE-PEN-DENCE,” he said slowly.“You gotta answer to NO man’s laws!”Except my father’s laws, it seemed,who still paid for his rent and 5th year of community college. And when I was young, I rememberasking myself when I would grow up to be like these men,thinking that it was a shame, the inevitability of it(for they were the only men I knew). as I dreamed up schemes to run awayand stay a childfor at least a little while longer.