I recently broke my collarbone in a bike race, my first such competition. I’ve been a runner most my life, competing in countless 5k’s throughout middle and high school cross country, and then two half-marathons as an adult. I’d once aspired to run a marathon, but a joint-attacking autoimmune disease has tempered those aspirations for now.
Tempered — or perhaps altered? You see, riding a bicycle is far easier on the joints as this disease-ridden young adult hobbles into middle-age. Cycling is also just objectively more fun than running: the wind blowing in my face rather than my body staggering into the wind. A few years ago, I got my first “big boy” bicycle and went all-in with cycling. Earlier this year I signed up for my first road race, and two weeks ago I competed.
And, well, I suppose I’ve already spoiled how that went.
I made it 58 painstaking miles to the top of a mountain before I lost control of my bike going downhill. I swerved and skidded and flew over my handlebars, landing squarely on my left shoulder. After five long hours of riding, I fell just three miles short of the finish line. I had started tearing up at the thought of the cheers and bells of that communal finish; instead, I closed my evening tearing up with a solitary trip to the ER.
I didn’t finish the race that day.
Didn’t enjoy my finish line meal.
Didn’t receive my finish line medal.
I didn’t do what most all the other men who raced that day did.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of myself. In those months leading up to race day — my so-called “training” period — I only ever maxed out at 23 miles over a couple hours in one bike ride. So, to have lasted 58 miles over five hours is certainly a feat accomplished. Those final three miles were all literally downhill; indeed, I completed the hardest work of that race.
But can I just be honest? Not quite finishing the bike race hurts way beyond this strain in my shoulder. And “not quite” feels like such a metaphor for my masculinity.
Prior to the race, crowded into a starting line alongside cyclists who clearly had more experience than me, as demonstrated by their dress and gear and physiques, I felt daunted. Combined with my lack of training, I wondered and even doubted whether I would indeed cross the finish line later that day. Whether I belonged.
But oh. If I were to finish that day: to wear the same medal and belong with all these athletic men? What a thing that would be.
Now, of course, I’m not saying the measure of a man is in his ability to finish a 60-mile race while sporting a six-pack, and that because I didn’t (and don’t) that I’m not one.
But this concept of attempting something difficult, and completing something difficult, alongside other men attempting and completing something difficult — well, it’s not everything. But it’s also not nothing.
I almost didn’t even make it to that fateful accident at mile 58. Somewhere around mile 45, climbing this never-ending mountain, my thighs seized with cramps like never before as I nearly toppled over. I literally sat in the dirt on the side of the road, guzzling water and coaxing my legs to work again. I thought I might quit, and I started to cry at the thought.
But my legs came back to life, and I kept going.
Kept climbing.
Kept crying and cursing and praying for even fifty meters of level ground. I knew if I could just push myself to the top, I’d be able to make it back down to the valley.
On the one hand, how accomplishing to have reached the summit despite the inner outcry to quit.
On the other, how defeating to be ferried back down into the city in a patrol vehicle. My bike tethered to the back, my shoulder clutched in wincing pain.
Thankfully, the fracture in my collarbone is about as minuscule as could be without being an ideal situation. It only affects my non-dominant arm, and I just can’t reach over my head. I can still type, at least.
I’m wearing a sling for six to eight weeks: a daily, if not hourly reminder of how, yes, I did strive for and do a great thing.
But it’s also an incomplete thing. A “not quite” that reverberates with each wincing movement.
As I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on this injury and this incompleteness, I’m asking myself over and over why this sort of thing matters so much to me: finishing a bike race, yes, but completing a difficult task all the more.
Ever since college, I’ve been drawn to difficult undertakings. Studying abroad at Oxford. Moving across the country to California. Living on the road for nine months. Coming out to the world.
Maybe it’s the Enneagram Four in me, the “suffering artist” stereotype, or maybe it’s something deeper.
With every difficult undertaking, I am chasing this desire to become a man. Or perhaps something more of one than the one I feel I am. Someone who looks more and more like the men in my circles.
I’ve learned through therapy and men’s groups that the truest measure of a man is the work he does inside, not the show he presents. Not the muscles or the medals.
But as someone starving for masculinity, it’s nice to see those tokens — validators of masculinity, however minor they are. I’m not representative of every voice in Your Other Brothers, but I’ve always struggled more with my masculinity than my sexuality.
Being attracted to men? Easy. (It’s not actually always easy, but roll with me here.)
But being a man? Gut-wrenching.
If I could push a big red button and change my sexual orientation from gay to straight, I don’t think I would. Not if I still have to carry sexual baggage as a broken straight person as I do a broken gay one. I’ll take my gay baggage at this point, thank you very much.
But if I could push a big red button and change my “masculine orientation,” so to speak, I’d slam that thing in a heartbeat. Harder than my shoulder hit the pavement on that fateful day.
What is it like to be confident as a man? To belong among men? To know it, feel it, hear it in my bones?
Despite my masculine progress through years of risk-taking, gaining confidence and affirmations from numerous men, queer and straight alike, this lingering question follows me wherever I go: am I man enough yet?
Several people have asked me, “Are you gonna try again next year?” After all, this bike race occurs every summer. I could sign up again in a few months. It’s a hard thought to entertain as I type this blog with my arm poking out of a sling.
What would a “real man” do? Would he be content, declaring that he already accomplished 94% of the hard thing? Or would he climb back on the bike and shoot for 100% next year?
Can I be a real man either way?
I never want fear to stop me from doing a hard thing. Which makes me want to attempt this particular hard thing all over again.
But I also want to be a man who knows he doesn’t need to complete the final 6% of a race to become more of a man. A man who is already affirmed by many other men, and most of all by God.
Showing up for the flashy hard thing is a nice challenge every once in a while. But I don’t want to miss all the other moments of masculinity in between.
Being a real man means showing up every day. Showing up in my work, showing up in my body. Showing up across from another man or among a circle of men. Showing up with God rather than slinking into the shadows.
Showing up is harder than climbing a mountain some days.
I don’t show up every day. But more often than not, I think I do. How I want that to be my masculine legacy more than the accolades from competitions.
But ugh. For now, this masculine sting stays with me in this sling.
Do you feel a need to “prove” your masculinity? How do you find assurance in the man you are? What hard things have you done as a man?