Dear Men, We Really Do Want a Romantic Warrior (And Yes, Such a Thing Exists)
To all the men actually reading this post, keep on reading. To all the women reading, hop on in. Although addressed to one, this is meant for both ends of the romantic sphere.
I have recently begun reading Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, a quite fetching read about a woman falling through time from WWII Scotland to its 1743 past, and having quite the run-ins with British Redcoats (deliciously called lobsterbacks, which cracks me up to no end) and Scottish Highlander warriors, fighting for their respective clan and their homeland.
(SPOILER ALERT!)
In the midst of her journey, Claire becomes entangled in the life of one Jamie MacTavish, a young Highland warrior, adrift from his clan. In a brilliant plot twist, the two of them end up being joined in marriage. Needless to say, the text is not for younger audiences (I hope that wouldn't be necessary to say, considering the violence alone would be enough to help readers differentiate appropriate ages), but it is positively beautiful and breathtaking. Much to my delight, it isn't written as smut or as pornographic material to purposefully lead the reader to arousal. It is written as two people in love, denying they're in love, and it is fantastic. I could write an entire blog post just on those scenes and their depth, but for now, I'll keep going.
(LAST CHANCE TO TURN BACK! SPOILER ALERT!)
In the midst of reading the chapters detailing their growing in knowledge of each other, in personal history, family, and daily interaction, Jamie reveals himself as a truly, genuinely romantic man. No, I don't mean he says five words to get Claire weak in the knees and all of a sudden they're on top of each other (*cough cough Fifty Shades of Gray*). Honestly, the parts of these scenes that struck me the most (and yes, made me sigh to the depths of my core and shut the book) were those moments when Jamie opened his heart in innocent, genuine honesty, not only in questions about their intimate moments (he's a virgin when they marry), but also in how he gives himself to her in all of his actions towards her. He goes out of his way to show her how enthralled he is with her, and that she has given him life and love and yes, passion, through to the depths of his soul. You find out that Jamie arranged specially to get Claire her beautiful wedding dress, so she could be wed as she deserved, and that he demanded having three days just the two of them in order to share and grow in intimacy as husband and wife should. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There is hardly a page that is turned without seeing another instance of why Jamie is one of the most well-written and absolutely breath-taking male characters I have ever read.
But in the back of my mind, even as I'm reading these pages and devouring this incredibly captivating story, I keep hearing these awful voices, cruel thoughts and nasty comments that society force-feeds us when confronted with anything true or beautiful. In this instance, it was about Jamie and his reality as a man in the world we know and live in today. I'm not going to lie, from the first chapter we meet him until where I am now in the book, I fell head over heels for him. For those of who know me, this won't surprise you, but honestly my affection and connection (and dare I say it, longing) for this character took even me by surprise. I know how that must sound, but it was far more than just the physical (although I must say, Jamie is quite the fetching young man); my captivation in him as a character, and especially a male character, was not physical. It was in the totality of his person: his honor, his strength, his purpose, his fight, his memory, everything. There was something about the way he held himself, spoke for himself, defended himself that was refreshing and true. And, at moments both unlooked for and truly brilliant, he revealed himself to be an educated, thoughtful man, confident in himself and in his ability to bend low and prove himself in kindness and loyalty.
And I read these pages, longing for such a man by my side.
If such a man exists.
There's the first thought that bumps its jagged head into my thoughts as I read or contemplate the story.
Real men aren't like that.
Again, the rug is pulled under my feet, and I have to refocus on what I am reading, and who the character actually is, to continue and enjoy his company.
He's not a real man. He just happens to be a virgin, just happens to be romantic, just happens to be educated, just happens to be handsome. Just happens to be just what every woman wants. Therefore, he's not real. Quit living in a fairy land. You get what you get, if you get anything that is. You'd be lucky if you even got to settle in a relationship, albeit a poor one.
Your Jamie will never come, because Jamie doesn't exist.
And thus revealed is my intention for this post.
To all you ladies out there, how often have we done this (myself included): thrown the entirety of the male gender under the bus with such blanketed statements as, "They're all pigs", "They only want one thing", "All men are jerks", "They're walking hormones", "You'll never meet an honest one", and the list goes on and on. It is about as fair to label the entirety of the flaws of humankind on the male gender as it is to blame all women for vanity, for distractedness, for fickleness.
Reading Jamie's character has helped me come to know how unfair I have been on the male gender. These thoughts and assumptions were not necessarily conscious, but at this point in my life so much is coming to the surface, and these embedded lies are part of it.
Are some men jerks? Oh yeah.
Are some women bitchy? Ah-yep.
Are people nasty, cruel, and vicious? Yes.
This is not restricted to gender, no matter how hard we try to box ourselves in.
To my male readers, I have a news flash for you. That jackass, bad boy, playboy attitude the world is telling you to flaunt is REALLY not attractive to anyone who wants a longterm relationship. Neither is the control-freak, the constant crier, or the clingy magnet.
You know what women want?
A man. A real, genuine man. With a real heart, real feelings, real strength, and yeah, guess what? Real romance.
We want you to be with us because the thought of not being with us tears you up inside. We want to have a place in your life. Not for convenience. Not for pleasure or sexual release. And not as a pressure valve for your anger or your frustration. We want you to allow yourselves to be so enamored with us that you go out of your way to romance us, not only to persuade us to be with you, but simply because you want to. Because you love us so much you want to shower that attention unsought for and without demanding a return for it.
We know you really want to be romantic. We also know that "tough" men are all the rage, and having emotional relationships or reactions of any kind is forbidden in some unwritten, unspoken bullshit rulebook, but we want you throw it out. We want you. All of you. Your flaws, your wounds, your hurt, your longings, your life. We want to walk it with you, in relation and in companionship, sharing the load and fighting with you, being for each other a steady defense and a shield. We don't want you to have to fight this world alone. So let us help you. Open our hearts by opening yours, and you will be greatly surprised by the results.
On the other end, we don't want to have to clean up constant emotional messes because you lack the emotional strength to function. We are here to be your companions, in marriage to be your lovers, but not in your life to be your mothers. That is not what we are made for, and if that is how you address relationships, they are not going to end well. Be emotional, be weak, let your guard down. But also be strong enough to take it up again when the battle calls. Because we'll be right there along with you, putting up our walls and putting on our armor and fighting as heartily as you are.
At the heart of this is simply a begging supplication to please just be you. That's all we really want. We don't want this manipulative, one-night stand fling for a quick fix. We don't want the bad boy flaunting basic rules of human decency and treating everyone (including us) like disposable toothbrushes. We don't want to be "taken care of" in the sense that we need rescuing because we are inherently weak. We want to take care of each other, not be held in a picnic basket and patted sweetly on the head. Make us feel safe, but don't make us feel trapped. Let us fight beside you. You shouldn't have to fight alone, and we don't want you to. Please, let us in.
You honestly have no idea how much we women long for a good, wholesome, romantic man. A man who knows himself, knows his heart, uses his strength to fight for those he loves, and provides in more than just a monetary way for his family. A man to journey with. A man to cry with. A man to love, and to love with.
I can already hear the objections, listing story after story of awful instances of women doing just what I said above they wouldn't, and treating their male counterparts like trash. I will not attempt to speak for those misgivings of my gender (mostly because they anger me so greatly I would have to end the post simply for the curse words I would want to use), but I will say this:
Men. We love you. We really do. We may act like we don't, and may lash out and say (and do) awful things out of fear, out of jealousy, out of anger. But there are those of us who still appreciate you, the real you, not the you hidden behind mask after mask of emotional numbing and false bravado.
And, I want to apologize, if not on behalf of my gender, then on behalf of myself. I apologize for what I have done, and what I have said, because of my fear and my anger. You have no idea how amazing you are. Yes, you, reading this right now. So I want you to take this minute and realize that yes, you, are God's son and that He loves you, and so do I. So do all of us women, even if we are too far away from ourselves and the truth in our hearts to see it.
Please take these words as an honest plea for an honest reaction and vulnerability in you. You are loved, and you are welcomed to be yourselves. We are not afraid of your emotions, your reactions, your pasts or your demons. We long for you and the truth of you in our lives. Take the leap, and be vulnerable. Expose your heart. Be stabbed, and bleed, and know what real life feels like. You won't be alone. A woman by your side or not, God shines down on your path, and will bless you for your honesty with us, and with Him.
As distant as the genders may appear to be from one another, we really do long for truth, honor, and beauty to reign just as much as you do.
To all you romantic warriors, lost in the sea of false faces and shallow lies, I offer a salute of good faith and hope for your heart, and your future. And to all you women, longing for that romantic warrior to sweep you off your feet, give the man beside you in your daily life, romantic or not, the benefit of the doubt, and respect and honor him just as much as you long for the same from him.
In the words of St. Francis de Sales, I end with this rejoinder:
"Be who you are and be that well."
I have recently begun reading Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, a quite fetching read about a woman falling through time from WWII Scotland to its 1743 past, and having quite the run-ins with British Redcoats (deliciously called lobsterbacks, which cracks me up to no end) and Scottish Highlander warriors, fighting for their respective clan and their homeland.
(SPOILER ALERT!)
In the midst of her journey, Claire becomes entangled in the life of one Jamie MacTavish, a young Highland warrior, adrift from his clan. In a brilliant plot twist, the two of them end up being joined in marriage. Needless to say, the text is not for younger audiences (I hope that wouldn't be necessary to say, considering the violence alone would be enough to help readers differentiate appropriate ages), but it is positively beautiful and breathtaking. Much to my delight, it isn't written as smut or as pornographic material to purposefully lead the reader to arousal. It is written as two people in love, denying they're in love, and it is fantastic. I could write an entire blog post just on those scenes and their depth, but for now, I'll keep going.
(LAST CHANCE TO TURN BACK! SPOILER ALERT!)
In the midst of reading the chapters detailing their growing in knowledge of each other, in personal history, family, and daily interaction, Jamie reveals himself as a truly, genuinely romantic man. No, I don't mean he says five words to get Claire weak in the knees and all of a sudden they're on top of each other (*cough cough Fifty Shades of Gray*). Honestly, the parts of these scenes that struck me the most (and yes, made me sigh to the depths of my core and shut the book) were those moments when Jamie opened his heart in innocent, genuine honesty, not only in questions about their intimate moments (he's a virgin when they marry), but also in how he gives himself to her in all of his actions towards her. He goes out of his way to show her how enthralled he is with her, and that she has given him life and love and yes, passion, through to the depths of his soul. You find out that Jamie arranged specially to get Claire her beautiful wedding dress, so she could be wed as she deserved, and that he demanded having three days just the two of them in order to share and grow in intimacy as husband and wife should. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There is hardly a page that is turned without seeing another instance of why Jamie is one of the most well-written and absolutely breath-taking male characters I have ever read.
But in the back of my mind, even as I'm reading these pages and devouring this incredibly captivating story, I keep hearing these awful voices, cruel thoughts and nasty comments that society force-feeds us when confronted with anything true or beautiful. In this instance, it was about Jamie and his reality as a man in the world we know and live in today. I'm not going to lie, from the first chapter we meet him until where I am now in the book, I fell head over heels for him. For those of who know me, this won't surprise you, but honestly my affection and connection (and dare I say it, longing) for this character took even me by surprise. I know how that must sound, but it was far more than just the physical (although I must say, Jamie is quite the fetching young man); my captivation in him as a character, and especially a male character, was not physical. It was in the totality of his person: his honor, his strength, his purpose, his fight, his memory, everything. There was something about the way he held himself, spoke for himself, defended himself that was refreshing and true. And, at moments both unlooked for and truly brilliant, he revealed himself to be an educated, thoughtful man, confident in himself and in his ability to bend low and prove himself in kindness and loyalty.
And I read these pages, longing for such a man by my side.
If such a man exists.
There's the first thought that bumps its jagged head into my thoughts as I read or contemplate the story.
Real men aren't like that.
Again, the rug is pulled under my feet, and I have to refocus on what I am reading, and who the character actually is, to continue and enjoy his company.
He's not a real man. He just happens to be a virgin, just happens to be romantic, just happens to be educated, just happens to be handsome. Just happens to be just what every woman wants. Therefore, he's not real. Quit living in a fairy land. You get what you get, if you get anything that is. You'd be lucky if you even got to settle in a relationship, albeit a poor one.
Your Jamie will never come, because Jamie doesn't exist.
And thus revealed is my intention for this post.
To all you ladies out there, how often have we done this (myself included): thrown the entirety of the male gender under the bus with such blanketed statements as, "They're all pigs", "They only want one thing", "All men are jerks", "They're walking hormones", "You'll never meet an honest one", and the list goes on and on. It is about as fair to label the entirety of the flaws of humankind on the male gender as it is to blame all women for vanity, for distractedness, for fickleness.
Reading Jamie's character has helped me come to know how unfair I have been on the male gender. These thoughts and assumptions were not necessarily conscious, but at this point in my life so much is coming to the surface, and these embedded lies are part of it.
Are some men jerks? Oh yeah.
Are some women bitchy? Ah-yep.
Are people nasty, cruel, and vicious? Yes.
This is not restricted to gender, no matter how hard we try to box ourselves in.
To my male readers, I have a news flash for you. That jackass, bad boy, playboy attitude the world is telling you to flaunt is REALLY not attractive to anyone who wants a longterm relationship. Neither is the control-freak, the constant crier, or the clingy magnet.
You know what women want?
A man. A real, genuine man. With a real heart, real feelings, real strength, and yeah, guess what? Real romance.
We want you to be with us because the thought of not being with us tears you up inside. We want to have a place in your life. Not for convenience. Not for pleasure or sexual release. And not as a pressure valve for your anger or your frustration. We want you to allow yourselves to be so enamored with us that you go out of your way to romance us, not only to persuade us to be with you, but simply because you want to. Because you love us so much you want to shower that attention unsought for and without demanding a return for it.
We know you really want to be romantic. We also know that "tough" men are all the rage, and having emotional relationships or reactions of any kind is forbidden in some unwritten, unspoken bullshit rulebook, but we want you throw it out. We want you. All of you. Your flaws, your wounds, your hurt, your longings, your life. We want to walk it with you, in relation and in companionship, sharing the load and fighting with you, being for each other a steady defense and a shield. We don't want you to have to fight this world alone. So let us help you. Open our hearts by opening yours, and you will be greatly surprised by the results.
On the other end, we don't want to have to clean up constant emotional messes because you lack the emotional strength to function. We are here to be your companions, in marriage to be your lovers, but not in your life to be your mothers. That is not what we are made for, and if that is how you address relationships, they are not going to end well. Be emotional, be weak, let your guard down. But also be strong enough to take it up again when the battle calls. Because we'll be right there along with you, putting up our walls and putting on our armor and fighting as heartily as you are.
At the heart of this is simply a begging supplication to please just be you. That's all we really want. We don't want this manipulative, one-night stand fling for a quick fix. We don't want the bad boy flaunting basic rules of human decency and treating everyone (including us) like disposable toothbrushes. We don't want to be "taken care of" in the sense that we need rescuing because we are inherently weak. We want to take care of each other, not be held in a picnic basket and patted sweetly on the head. Make us feel safe, but don't make us feel trapped. Let us fight beside you. You shouldn't have to fight alone, and we don't want you to. Please, let us in.
You honestly have no idea how much we women long for a good, wholesome, romantic man. A man who knows himself, knows his heart, uses his strength to fight for those he loves, and provides in more than just a monetary way for his family. A man to journey with. A man to cry with. A man to love, and to love with.
I can already hear the objections, listing story after story of awful instances of women doing just what I said above they wouldn't, and treating their male counterparts like trash. I will not attempt to speak for those misgivings of my gender (mostly because they anger me so greatly I would have to end the post simply for the curse words I would want to use), but I will say this:
Men. We love you. We really do. We may act like we don't, and may lash out and say (and do) awful things out of fear, out of jealousy, out of anger. But there are those of us who still appreciate you, the real you, not the you hidden behind mask after mask of emotional numbing and false bravado.
And, I want to apologize, if not on behalf of my gender, then on behalf of myself. I apologize for what I have done, and what I have said, because of my fear and my anger. You have no idea how amazing you are. Yes, you, reading this right now. So I want you to take this minute and realize that yes, you, are God's son and that He loves you, and so do I. So do all of us women, even if we are too far away from ourselves and the truth in our hearts to see it.
Please take these words as an honest plea for an honest reaction and vulnerability in you. You are loved, and you are welcomed to be yourselves. We are not afraid of your emotions, your reactions, your pasts or your demons. We long for you and the truth of you in our lives. Take the leap, and be vulnerable. Expose your heart. Be stabbed, and bleed, and know what real life feels like. You won't be alone. A woman by your side or not, God shines down on your path, and will bless you for your honesty with us, and with Him.
As distant as the genders may appear to be from one another, we really do long for truth, honor, and beauty to reign just as much as you do.
To all you romantic warriors, lost in the sea of false faces and shallow lies, I offer a salute of good faith and hope for your heart, and your future. And to all you women, longing for that romantic warrior to sweep you off your feet, give the man beside you in your daily life, romantic or not, the benefit of the doubt, and respect and honor him just as much as you long for the same from him.
In the words of St. Francis de Sales, I end with this rejoinder:
"Be who you are and be that well."
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