A few days ago I posted part of Garrison Keillor's The Book of Guys. Here is some more

Part one here

A guy said, "I ain't no misogynist or chauvinist but I got to say, women are getting awfully impossible to please these days. I've been busting my butt for years trying to keep women happy, and they're madder at me now than they were before I started trying so hard. I quit playing softball and deer hunting and took up painting delicate watercolors, still lifes mostly, and tossing salads, and learned how to discuss issues and feelings and concerns and not make jokes about them, and they're still angry at me. A guy can't win. Boys, let me tell you this for your own good and it'll save you a lot of time later in life: most women down deep believe that everything wrong is men's fault and nothing you can ever do will change that. So don't worry about it. Live your life." Oya! we all yelled

A great big bearded guy stepped into the circle. "I sort of miss communism. When the Soviet Union fell apart—I don't know—it seemed like everything went slack. There was no point anymore. Guys lost interest in baseball, guns—guys quit messing with cars. My son never gets under a hood. Instead he tries to get in touch with his feelings, tries to understand his girlfriend and keep a nice close peaceful relationship. Something doesn't add up here. We're selling out our manhood, bit by bit, trying to buy a little peace and quiet, and you know something? it won't work. Self-betrayal never works! I say nuts to sensitivity. Go ahead and fart. Go ahead." So we did. All at once. The fire flamed up blazing and bright. It felt good.

I realized right then, standing in that circle, that I know many more women than men. Women are easier to talk to. So I go have lunch with a woman at, say, Le Domicile de Daphne restaurant, and we talk and talk about various things that intrigue us, and suddenly I lean forward across the plate of ziti and sun-dried-tomatoes and whisper, "Bozo alert," and nod toward a guy in a dumb T-shirt (Help me. I've fallen and I can't reach my beer) and a blue satin team jacket, his cap turned backwards, who has lumbered into the restaurant searching for a toilet.

For more than thirty years, I have been nudging women and pointing out dopey men to them so that women would know that I am no bozo. And here I was arm in arm with the very sort of guys I had always made fun of. I felt ashamed.

I stepped forward and sang them a song:

There was once a shy young man who left his country home

And moved to the city to be more free,

For in the city no one cared if you stayed out half the night

And people didn't notice every time you bought a new pair of pants.

So he enjoyed a carefree life amongst the Broadway crowd

And attended shows they did not have in Minnesota,

And the only thing that worried him was what if he got sick

And fell down in the street, would anybody notice?

He decided to find out, so he laid down in the gutter,

And right away a woman came and knelt down by his side,

And it was Gladys, his old neighbor, how was in the city visiting her niece Denise,

And she said to him, "Jim, I always knew that you were no good."

"That's right," they said. Oya.

And then the head man of the S.O.B., the Big Burner himself, stepped into the circle, to talk about Bernie. He had been Bernie's best friend.

Bernie was a good guy who married a great girl, Jackie, who then became a feminist, but that was okay by Bernie, and he supported her in all that she did as she flew around to women's conferences and seminars, gave speeches at dinners, was on the boards of NOW and NARAL and the ACLU and ACT and WARM and WARN and YES, and seldom was at home there in Minneapolis, but that was okay, and she was happy and if she was happy then he was happy. One winter when the concrete business slacked off, Bernie thought he'd maybe go ice fishing for a week with his buddies, play poker and tell some stories, have some laughs—though Jackie thought it was dumb beyond belief and gave him a hard time about him wanting to go off with those rednecks and said, "I thought you got it, but obviously you don't"—and then, the day before he was to leave, he ran into the Big Burner on the street and told him how wonderful it would be to see the guys again. "I haven't gone ice fishing in fifteen years, but finally I got Jackie to let me go," he said, "and boy, am I looking forward to it. Well," he said, "I gotta cash a check before the bank closes." And he turned and two seconds later he was rubbed off the face of the earth by a runaway gravel truck.

"She got the house, the concrete business, everything, all that he'd worked so hard to build up, and you know? she didn't share much of it with those daughters either. She sold the company for six million dollars to some jerks who then ran it into the ground and she built herself a big house on Barbados and bought an apartment inNew York where she entertains liberals and artists and feminists by the truckload. That's what happened to the life and hard work of Bernie, boys. It went to feminism and he never got to go fishing.

We all leaned forward and spat on the gound.

"He was a loser, boys, and the world loves winners. People used to love their losing teams, but no more. The owners are in it for the money and the fans are in it for the victories. If yo ulose, you're shit. Well, boys, were are all losers like Bernie—you, me, we're drunk, confused, sad, and we smell like dead trout—but I loved him and I love all of you.

"Here's to that trip he never took and the fun he never had. He wanted to get out of line for a few days, hoist a few, tell some jokes, be with the boys. So let's do it. Here's to Bernie. Let 'er rip."

And we drank a long toast and gave six long whoop, Eeeeeeee-ha!

By four a.m. there was little left to say and nobody in condition to say it. So, about six, I went home.