I totally want to be this guy…

I’ve never really been what one could call a “manly-man”. While I can appreciate a beautiful automobile, I couldn’t tell a carburetor from a carbuncle. I don’t dig sports. I’m not into fishing or guns (though I’m not against them either–in fact, I think a fish-gun would be pretty awesome…). I feel uncomfortable in “breastaurants” like Hooters or Tilted Kilt. And strip clubs, frankly, depress me. I even get wigged out by those SportClips places where women cut your hair and massage your head while wall-to-wall monitors display every shade and variety of ESPN ever developed.

Suffice it to say–I’ve always been a little different.

…but I’m really more like this guy.

My discomfort around the accoutrements of masculinity extend to my dealings with various icons of the type. Essentially: mechanics, laborers, technicians–your typical “fix-it men”. I never know how to carry myself around them. And when they describe what the issue of the day is, I always have this creepy feeling deep down in my gut–a shadowy, shame-covered knot that says that if I was a “real man” I’d already know what the problem was. Not only that, but I know to the bottom of my soul that they are secretly judging my Manly-chlorians and find me severely lacking.

This is completely irrational, I realize. This is all about my own insecurities, not about the big manly-man intimidating me. I simply allow myself to feel intimidated. But nevertheless, it’s true.

So when I was visited today by a very friendly and competent air conditioning technician to assess why my air conditioner is working so damn hard to bring my house down to 78° (I have it set at 73), my gut clenched and churned and I felt like a complete moron. Despite the fact that if I knew how to fix an AC, I wouldn’t have had to call a tech. And lots of people call techs–that’s why they have jobs.  Nevertheless, I felt like I shouldn’t have had to call.

Oh well. At least they can’t revoke my Man-Card™. I just have to take solace in the fact that I got Geek-Cred™ instead.