It was 3am on a hot summer night and I just couldn’t sleep. I tried to relax my mind and slip into dreamland, but I just couldn’t get it together. Vivid memories were colliding with anxiety and I was flooded with emotion. We had a big day coming up and a long drive ahead of […]

Check out the fascinating advertisement that popped up on Craigslist recently from a group of guys searching for a “BBQ Dad” to handle the grill at their outdoor party. My sixteen year old son shared it with me and thought it was hilarious. While it’s written in a sarcastic and even mocking tone, it speaks […]

Top 25 ManQuest Father Tips  There’s an “Ultimate List of 45 Man Tips” floating around on the internet that I found quite interesting and amusing.  Most of the words of fatherly advice were practical pieces of information to help a son succeed in life, such as “buy a plunger before you need a plunger” and […]

A familiar scene plays itself out in households across the world every evening around bedtime. As teenage boys are getting ready to sack out for the night they do their best to sneak by mom to avoid giving her a kiss goodnight.  What was once a warm and tender show of affection between mother and […]

Since when did it become fashionable for teenage boys to stop wearing a coat in extremely cold weather? I know it’s been the winter of “Frozen” and “the cold doesn’t bother me anyway” but I’ve noticed more young men discarding their coats when they should be piling on more layers. Guys have been doing crazy […]

Movies with Masculine Messages Movies are a tremendous vehicle for teaching teenage boys about authentic manhood.  Because of how we’re wired up, males don’t typically have a strong connection to our inner emotional lives. So movies often create a natural relational bridge for guys.  Men often draw great inspiration from classic movies and we enjoy […]

  Motorcycle Mayhem A few years back my grade school age boys were throwing the football around on our quiet, cul-de-sac on a warm September day.   I was working in the house and heard a loud roar of a motorcycle going by.  I knew it was probably the guy who lived at the end of […]

It’s been a week since the horrific tragedy in Connecticut and people are still trying to make sense out of what happened at Sandy Hook.   I’m sure the families of the victims are still in utter and complete shock as they bury their children.  In the coming weeks, as they move through the stages of […]

My all-time favorite television sitcom is a show called “The Wonder Years”.  It’s the saga of a teenage boy growing up in the late 1960s.  Kevin Arnold, the show’s protagonist, chronicles the inner thoughts and feelings of a middle school boy finding his way in a turbulent world.   Back in college, “The Wonder Years” absolutely […]

Although I played basketball in college, people are often surprised to find out that my first love is college football.  I’ve been a Michigan fan since I was a young boy and remember sitting around the radio listening to Bob Ufer call the games – with a football in my hand.  When I finally went […]