Friendship is a subject we come back to time and time again at What Men Do. Rarely a week goes by here at WMD HQ when the topic doesn’t get some air-time in the regular conversations that start with the words “I’ve been thinking…..”.

It’s been even more prevalent in my mind of late as we are currently in the process of producing

a third edition of the What Men Do Guide (watch this space) and the chapter on Friendship is currently languishing on my desk awaiting a rewrite – having been passed between the three of us like a baby whose nappy needs changing.

There are two problems faced when writing about Friendship. The first is something we have observed before; the fact that any words used to describe the relationship between two very close Friends always seem to be somehow dissatisfying, always falling short of the mark in some way.

It is this reason why one of our favourite quotes is Michel de Montaigne’s words describing the reasons for his Friendship with Etienne de la Boetie: “because it was him; because it was me.”

The second problem with writing about Friendship is that it requires you to look in to the subject with some degree of depth, and once put under scrutiny you realise that it defies making any sense.

When a close Friend is on your mind it appears as though everything is always hugs and rainbows – the knowledge that this guy has got your back no matter the situation is the foundation of all thoughts about him.

But when pulling that bond apart in an attempt to see its inner workings suddenly all logic ceases to exist. You realise that if this was to be examined in some kind of academic way – say every detail of each partner in the Friendship was listed side by side, or in the scientists favourite form, a graph – then the reasons for these two lives to overlap, nevermind be tightly bonded, are tenuous to the brain at best.

And forget about the hugs and rainbows. While it’s true that in a tight Friendship the other guy provides you with happiness by the bucket load and many of the high points in life emotionally, they also seem to be the ones that provide the most frustration, anger and heartbreak.

Whether it’s the frustration of saying ‘everything is fine’ when it clearly isn’t – why won’t this guy I’m supposedly tight with share what’s darkening his mind – or the blood boiling anger when the boneheaded bastard seems to show no support at all to decisions you’ve made, Friends can be the most annoying of fuckers.

But there’s always the tickling thought in the back of your mind, even in the midst of a earthshaking shouting match, or even a full blown punch up (in which no matter how angry you are the punches are always pulled), that even though on the surface you hate the guy right now you know that if something major happened that instant – say your phone rings and you discover a loved one is ill or worse – then the fight, no matter how intense, will immediately be put on hold and your Friend has your back once again. All disagreements forgotten about.

Even when you think back to those times of anger and frustration the conclusion always is that it’s worth it to have that guy as your Friend, to have him as the guy shielding your back in battle – even when you’re tempted to kill the fucker, and he seems intent on killing you, for some reason you still trust him with your life. Logically, it makes no sense.

But then why should it? Logic, ‘making sense’, these exist in the realms of what we call the

‘Thinking’ man, the area which developed alongside writing and reading which, considering the time that Homo Erectus has been around, ain’t that long.

The bonding inherent in Friendship is far more primordial, deeply rooted in the unexplainable ‘Sensing’ and irrationality of Feelings.

And maybe shrouded in mystery – being unexplainable – is exactly how it belongs, the unknown being at the heart of what makes life Real and provides the Struggle necessary to being alive.

As a final thought, the hardships which go alongside a Friendship are inevitable and are a positive as they tend to strengthen the bond that exists between you.

As Bob Marley put it: “The truth is, everyone’s going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.”

There is an article currently doing the social media rounds titled “How Sad Young Douchebags Took Over Modern Britain”. Originally appearing on Vice.com, it looks at how young males seem to be slipping in to a scarily vapid existence, with many appearing to be nothing more than an “erection in a vest” looking like “Ken dolls dipped in tea and covered in biro”.

The article is obviously over-sensationalised for ‘comic’ effect, but in amongst the rant like tirade there is a genuinely worrying message. Time and again we are reminded of the lost, almost purgatory like state, that modern young males find themselves in. Usually this comes in a more obvious form, such as the horrific stats on male depression and suicide, and the awareness raising work of organisations such as CALM.

But the preening, cock-sure, penis waving of so many young guys, particularly in towns on a Friday and Saturday night, is surely another manifestation of this malaise which has taken over the British male – and I’m sure it’s not confined to our island.

Many modern guys have ceased to live at any personal depth, everything is now purely about surface. This is reflected by the importance which is placed on appearance. Ridiculous amounts spent on designer clothes; beauty regimes that in the past would have been seen as excessive even by a billionaire’s arm candy; the obsession on what the Vice article calls “balloon animal muscles”.

The muscles are the biggest tell-tale sign of the surface element of these guy’s lives. For the most part these are not – or are only partly – muscles crafted through time in the gym and rigorous exercise. Obsessive weight lifting still screams of a vain surface existence but at least there has been some work put in, a degree of effort, the struggle which indicates something may be worthwhile. But even that takes too much time for these guys who want to wank over the image they see in the mirror, so they spend their money on muscle building supplements – these guys now live at such a surface level they need to take short-cuts to vanity.

And to what purpose?

Therein lies the point. There is no purpose. These guys have latched on to vanity and self obsession because it’s easier than the search for purpose and the risk that it entails. Life for them is looking for the next shag – young men have become sluts.

Towards the end of the Vice article it suggests that this situation has come about because nobody wants the young British male anymore. The breadwinners of old seem unable to find a new purpose in society and so shy away from any purpose.

The young male’s crisis of existence seemed terminal enough when viewed purely through the lens of guys not being able to handle any more and taking their own lives. When coupled with the pandemic of walking erections hitting the town every weekend it seems that the guys who are coping with life, embracing the struggle and dealing with it, striving for purpose and doing What Men Do, are actually in the minority.

The Adult Man is an endangered species and, unless as a gender we tell the easy life to go fuck itself and embrace the hard route, aiming to become as great as we can be as individuals, extinction may be around the corner.

I fucked up last week.

It was the really annoying kind of fuck up that was beyond any earthly control – a moment where ability was found lacking but Time (that bitch that She is) wouldn’t allow the breathing space required for the necessary improvement.

In the What Men Do Guide we place great importance on the idea

of ‘seeing things through’. If you agree to a commitment – be it personal or professional, paid or voluntary – then it is vital to your Self Respect (if nothing else) that you make it to the end.

But what happens if, due to whatever the circumstance, Fate conspires against you and it proves impossible for you to fulfil you allotted task?

This is where my fuck up comes in. Maybe I’m being harsh on myself calling it a fuck up, but it’s certainly the way it felt.

I had agreed to a role in a project here at the Charity I work for in Halifax. The project was nothing particularly alien to me and the kind of thing I’m part of several times every year. However in this instance I had been provided the opportunity for a different kind of involvement than I’m used to, a chance to work on muscles which usually get ignored.

Of course I jumped at this offer and threw myself into the task with huge excitement and enthusiasm. Early on I realised this was going to be a challenge – the coveted Struggle which means you’re growing as a Man – but I told myself that if it was going to be easy then it would be bordering on pointless.

But as the project crept ever closer – and in passing I’m wondering if it is only me who finds the calendar an enemy in situations like this, where you look at it one morning and think

‘hang on, when did last week happen?’ – as the project crept closer I realised my ability wasn’t improving at the same rate as the days were passing. Suddenly it’s five days until the project is due to start and, like a punch to the stomach, I realise there is no way I am going to be able to perform my task at the required level.

I had no choice but to let the team down.

I handled this part very badly, allowing despair to take over and wallowing in a rather large pit of self pity. I wasn’t particularly bothered that my ability had been found lacking, indeed in any other situation I would have welcomed it as it has opened up an avenue for self improvement, an obvious starting point for extending my talents in that area. The blow for me, and it was a huge blow, was that I had let the other guys on the project down.

This wallowing only made the situation worse for my Self Respect as I realised that the only way I could begin to make up for my fuck up was to put things right to ensure the project’s success – as they say in the theatre ‘the show must go on’. By the time I had grasped the situation by the Balls in the required manner – this being the day after my realisation of my limitations – the replacement had already been found. I didn’t even have the chance to make things right myself.

What I should have done was to face the problem head on and not played ‘woe is me’ – at least not until the continuance of the project was ensured.

That’s the part my Self Respect has to deal with now so that in future I won’t throw in the towel when I should get back in the ring and fight another round.