I recently got suggested the idea of listening to audiobooks and I have pretty much found it an amazing revelation. Usually I just listen to music on the way to work which is all fine and good, but the idea of actually listening to something useful on my daily commute is an intriguing and productive idea.

My first audiobook so far is Bossypants by Tina Fey. She is an amazing comedian and I have been looking very forward to going to work every morning just to hear another chapter of the book.

Anyway, she brings up a few serious thought-provoking points throughout her book. One of the earlier ones was the idea of when she 'first felt like a woman'. There was some survey done with a group of women and apparently most women responded they first felt like a woman when some dude yelled something nasty at them from a car.

Interpret that how you like, but that got me thinking about when I first "felt like a man". And scanning my memories, I felt like I couldn't really pinpoint any particular moment. I went through all the usual life milestones, but it's like none of them really made me feel like a MAN.

There are all the sexual and pubertal ones and those I went through and I remember thinking at the time 'this is happening' or 'this is it?', but afterwards, though expecting some profound life-changing feeling, it didn't happen.

And then there are all the ones related to life and academic achievement and of course as Tina Fey points out, none of those are worthy of validating my existence as a man. Obtaining an education? Overrated.

Even now, as a chronologically grown man with an actual professional career, I'm not sure I can say I feel like a man. Sure, in my line of work I have done countless things to patients that have violated pretty much any semblance of their personal privacy, but none of that makes me feel like a man. (and thank goodness for that. "I first felt like a man, when I gave my first rectal exam to an 80-year old man!" No thanks.) I have broken the worst kind of news and had serious discussions about things I never thought I'd be capable of, but while there are days I do feel validated that I am a legit doctor, my career for the most part has not influenced how I personally view myself.

I guess this is to say I am still waiting for that breakthrough moment when something in my brain kicks and I truly feel like my balls have dropped and my voice has broken two octaves. Maybe this all has to do with being in the closet and I feel so child-like because there is a whole side of me I have tried to repress from the world for my whole life, and the moment I am really open to the world as a gay man, then will I feel like a complete and total bonafide bad-ass.

Or maybe not. People keep talking about how men (well let's call them males) of my generation go through their 20s without this sense of purpose and live in this perpetual state of childhood 'cuz of the way society is nowadays and all that. I mean, I definitely get that. I have a good group of friends back home, that though I love them to death, could probably fit that categorization. I could probably fit that categorization.

About the only time I really could say I started to feel like a man was back in 8th grade. One of my friends was having a pool party and all my usual group of friends was there. We were just horsing around in the pool and then one kid, who was ostensibly the coolest kid in our group and probably our entire school, noticed I had started growing armpit hair. He started teasing me about it and wrestling me around so he could show it off to everyone in the pool. I'm sure the other guys were equally or farther along on the puberty train as me so I was pretty embarrassed that he was making a big deal about it---BUT at the same time this was the coolest kid in the class paying attention to me.

Now having related this story, I see that I am no different from the scores of women of Tina Fey's book who needed another man to validate their entrance into maturity. Great.

In my defense this just happened to be the earliest vague recollection I have of really entering puberty. But to show you how scientific I have always been, even before the pool incident, when I first noticed I was going through puberty at like age 12, I wanted to see how fast my dick was growing so I would measure my erect penis every month or so to mark my progress. While I do remember what my first measurement was and am pleased to reflect that I have gained several inches since then, I unfortunately lost interest in the experiment a few months in and don't remember my actual penis-growing progress. Kind of a shame cuz I think it would be kinda funny now to look back and see the time velocity it took for me to get to "full-size". Man I'm a dweeb.

Anyway, bottom line is, after all this time, I still feel like I'm missing an essential part of myself that feels like it is a real man in this cold harsh world. I'm not sure if it will ever really click with me, but I sure hope it does. Faithful readers, when was the first time you all felt like a man for the first time? Would love to hear your stories....or know there are others out there who feel like they've missed the boat too!