Innermost Thought

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April 23, 2003

What It Takes To Be A Man

I passed by a Pizza Hut the other day. Seeing the familiar red roof shaped like a three-dimensional trapezoid immediately brought back memories of my years growing up in Graham, Tx. My Dad used to work at the local Pizza Hut there. He may have been a manager; he may have been the guy behind the counter. I don't really know for sure as I was less than 5 years old. One day he and I drove to his 'Hut so that he could do or get a few things. I remember listening to Olivia Newton John on the way there and singing along. "Please Mister Please. Don't play B17. It was our song it was his song but it's oh-ooo-oh-ver." Olivia and I could sang, I tell you. Riding in the brown ventura and fore-going the 8-track for the good ole radio.

Once we got to the restaurant, I had to wait for my Dad to finish his tasks. I remember being really excited that I had permission to sit in a chair just outside the office so I could watch the man making the pizzas. Roll out the dough. Toss them up and catch them still in one piece. It was amazing to my five-year old self, this raw talent that the pizzamaker exuded. I asked my Dad if he knew how to make the pizzas. He said he did but he wouldn't have time on this day as he had to finish his many tasks in the office. I think he was a manager and only the pizzaguys were lucky enough to get to make the pizzas. At this moment in all of my less-than-five-year-old wisdom I knew what it took to be a real man. A real man could roll out the dough into a huge, thin, perfect circle, toss it high in the air so it would spiral around and around and then catch it so that it would lay flat and perfect on the counter. At that moment, I thought of what a really amazing man my dad was because he could make a pizza like that too.

My dad could also make a mean vanilla shake. My sister and I used to beg him to make them all the time but they were treats. No one can make a vanilla shake like my dad. Not even me. I tried to recreate the recipe recently and I am quite sure I am missing a key ingredient.

When I was five, finding the honor in men was so much more simple than it has proved to be a quarter of a century later. Dads inevitably fall of the impossible pedestals that little girls build for them, especially in the teenage years. Those little girls are left to wonder what does it really take to make a man. A girl dates, experiments with different walks of men, tries them on like winter coats. Will this one keep me warm or does it just look stylish? Is it a better coat because I spent more? I like to think of myself as someone who appreciates the basic unsung qualities in a man; honesty, loyalty, sense of humor, ethics but sometimes that all gets to be too much to worry about. Some days I just think it would be okay to find a man who just knows how to toss a good pizza.

Posted by mermu at April 23, 2003 10:43 PM

Comments

Posted by: Theresa at April 25, 2003 12:35 AM

Posted by: Elizabeth at April 24, 2003 03:17 PM

Posted by: stepan at April 24, 2003 10:23 AM

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