Marriage and the Elimination of Manhood

There was a time not so long ago when I was a man. I could shoot pool all night. All my shirts were plaid. I knew all the top running backs in the NFL. I could pass gas with impunity. Poker night was every Tuesday. I was a manly man. Then I got married. Little did I know that my wedding day would be my last day as a man. From this point on I was something else -- not quite a man, definitely not a woman, but something in between -- a husband.

The Decline and Fall of Manhood

The Question.
It started simply enough, as most things do, with a single question. While planning the wedding, we wanted to do things together. So naturally my wife-to-be would ask, "So honey, what do you think of this?" It's such a simple question, but it was indeed, the beginning of the end. Suddenly my wife had me thinking about fondant versus butter cream icing, types of lace, flowers, color-coordination and a whole host of things that had never been in my brain before. And just as suddenly, my comprehensive knowledge of Heisman Trophy winners no longer seemed very useful. As it turns out, though I didn't know it at the time, most of what I knew would prove to be equally useless.

Out with the Plaid, in With the Good
One evening my wife and I had a dinner engagement. While I'm getting dressed, my wife casually asks - you aren't going to wear that, are you? Um... well yeah, that's why I'm putting it on. Besides these are my nicest pair of boots. "Oh." was all she said. It was all she had to say. It was enough to make me doubt twenty-some years of dressing myself. Of course I still dress myself, but the options I have to choose from have changed. A shirt here and there for Christmas. A pair of slacks for my birthday. A nice polo on our anniversary. Suddenly I have an entire wardrobe of clothes that have been picked out for me. Not a single one is flannel. Don't get me wrong. I'm not complaining, but if clothes make the man, then my wife has made me.