As far as manly shit...does this count:
**MASSIVE FRAT WARNING**
I got Micro-Wiggy (my 7-year old granddaughter - I help my daughter raise her and she's with me a lot of the time) off the school bus yesterday afternoon. It was her 2nd day back to school - 2nd grade.
Anyway, she apparently got hurt at recess. She was climbing on the monkey bars, slipped, fell off them, and slammed pretty hard. I couldn't tell by how she described it if she actually hit the bars on the way down...I don't think so. But she did land fairly flat-backed and got the wind knocked out of her.
She was telling me about it, what happened, etc.
She said apparently the teacher tried to call my daughter, but she was too busy at work, didn't see the call, etc. I guess they wanted her to come pick Micro-Wiggy up or something?
"Pfffft", I said. "You didn't need that."
"Why not?" she asks.
"Well, you & I are here now, right?"
"Yeah."
"And are you ok?"
"Yeah," she says again.
"See? Then why should mama have come & picked you up? You're tough. Yeah, it hurt it was crazy when it first happened for sure..." (I then go into a time I slipped on the ice when I was not much older than her & had the wind knocked out of me...which made her laugh) "...but you're good now, right?"
"Yeah," she says...I can tell she's thinking.
"In fact," I say, "This is actually the BEST thing that could happened!"
"WHY!?!" she asks, absolutely stunned.
"Well, you'd never been on the monkey bars before, right?"
"Right."
"And you fell and busted your tail pretty hard the FIRST time you tried to climb 'em, right?"
"Right."
"And you're good now, right?"
"Right."
"See? Now you know they can't do ANYTHING bad to you. The very FIRST time you tried to climb, you fell and knocked the wind of out you. It was hard to breathe for a minute and I'm sure a little scary. But you ended up Ok, and even if you're a little sore, now, you're Ok, right?"
I hold her hand when we walk to my house, so I proceed to swing her arm all about, which makes her laugh.
"Yeaaaaaah", she says giggling.
"So you already had the WORST thing happen to you, and it was no big deal, right?"
"Yeah, you're right!"
"Then if you wanna climb on it tomorrow, it'll be nothing. You have no reason to be scared, since you've already felt the WORST it can do to you, and it's no big deal!"
"Yeah..." she says kinda quietly. "But I think I'll avoid it, just in case."
"Why?", I ask. "The monkey bars *already* tried to go after you & couldn't do anything. So why not climb? You literally had the WORST thing that could happen to you, and now you're laughing, right?"
"Yeah," she says, smiling.
"So why avoid it? I would get "just in case" if you thought it could do something bad. But you've already taken the worst the monkey bars can dish out and shown them you're tougher than that."
Now she's smiling huge.
"YEAH!" she says.
About then, we get to my house and the subject is dropped.
Fast-forward to this afternoon, and I get her off the school bus again. We're walking back to my house.
"How's your back, kiddo?", I ask, shaking her arm all about.
"hahaha Gramps, I feel GREEEEAAAAAT!" she exclaims.
"Nice!", I try to say...but before I can even say that, she interrupts me...
"GUESS WHAT!?!" she exclaims.
"hahah what, kiddo?"
"I climbed on the monkey bars again. And it was soooooo fun!" she says.
I smile & tell her I'm proud of her.
"You weren't scared?" I ask.
"Why should I be? The monkey bars did their worst yesterday and it was no big deal, right?" she asks, as if she's teaching me.
"You're right", I say, half laughing.
She then goes on to describe every element of recess, as well as the rest of her 3rd day of school on the rest of the walk back to my place.
So if that counts...making my 7-year old granddaughter a bit tougher is the manly shit I did today (and yesterday lol).