He was the baby boy with the stuffed teddy bear in his crib. He grows to be the curly haired kid shooting hoops with his buddies at the park. Time passes. He opens the car door for his date at his high school prom. A few weeks later he’s handed his graduation diploma.

Then one morning while he’s brushing his teeth, he’s surprised at who he sees in the mirror. The boy is gone. The face he sees belongs to that of a man, a man who will become a husband and a father.

My childhood took place in the 1960s when the word “father” was defined in concrete words. Strictly the breadwinner, the provider, the head of family, he commanded respect just by his title. Fatherhood was something that arrived from his loins. He passed along the raising of his children to their mother, who changed their diapers, fed their bellies and wiped their tears.

A man had to be the king of his castle, keeping law and order just by his warrior presence, and if necessary, with his drawn sword. No one cared to ask him what lay inside his heart. He had to be cold- blooded, lock out any feelings of insecurity or incapability that threatened his mantra.

He was haunted by the fate of his brotherhood dying too young. The number one killer of men between the ages of 50 and 60 during that decade was a massive heart attack brought on by years of hidden, unrelenting stress.

The battles he lost were internal, struggles for self-awareness against society’s demands for what a man must be. My dad quit school after the eighth grade to get a job. After his mom passed away at age 40, his father died a few months later in a mining accident.

My dad had no choice but to become the caretaker for five younger siblings. At age 16, he had to take off his baseball uniform and put on his man pants.

Back then, a man didn’t show much affection. He was a no cry, tough guy who shut down demonstrative displays of love. I have wondered if any man 60 years ago loved himself enough to love anyone else. His responsibilities were to God, family and country, leaving him no time to nurture his independence.

That man lacked authenticity. He needed what he couldn’t find: to feel happy, to feel human, to minimize his stress so that he could live long enough to see his grandchildren.

The definition of a man’s role has evolved since those days. Now he can show emotion. He can take on the responsibilities of shared parenthood. Change diapers. Cook dinners. Wrestle his son on the living room carpet. Sing goofy songs to 5-year-old daughter.

But his role comes with different challenges that my father never faced. Today’s man lives in a world fueled by adversity and chaos. At night, he reads fairy tale bedtime stories to his daughter. In the morning, he reads business contracts in the boardroom or blueprints at the construction site.

He puts down the baseball glove he uses to play catch with his son and picks up a hammer, a pipe wrench, a remote-control device to present a slideshow to his CEO. He’s no longer just a breadwinner. He’s a hunter, a healer, a heavyweight. He fixes the toilet on Saturday morning and five hours later he packs the car for a family trip to the beach.

He must rise above the flood level when his wife tosses an ocean’s worth of their relationship problems on his plate at the kitchen table. He must build purpose with discipline, determination and diligence, and keep a sense of humor to stop his frustrations from turning into anger.

Like the man of the ’60s, he must fight to forge a self-identity while everyone inside his life’s circle wants him to be what they need him to be.

He wakes up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, with a fear of losing it all. In the morning, he reads a quote in the newspaper written by a philosopher from ancient Rome.

“What are you afraid of losing when nothing in the world belongs to you?”

The modern man understands his legacy is his loyalty to the people he loves. He teaches his children that failure is the greatest lesson in life. You never lose. You either win or you learn. He has driven the road to hell that feels like heaven, and he’s driven the road to heaven that feels like hell. His world surrounds him with false promises and broken dreams, but he knows that if you can trust a man’s word, you can trust the man.

He thinks about the wonders of the universe built by the same life force that created him. He knows you can’t go back to revisit the past, to be that boy again. He has to live in the present moment as his time clock subtracts minutes, hours, days and years from the rest of his life.

In the twilight of his summers, and with all his failures and successes behind him, he sits on the back porch drinking a cold beer while he gazes across the horizon at the setting sun.

He is an imperfect man who tried his best to be the perfect man. He lost a few battles in the war, but he never surrendered, never gave up, never quit on the life that had been chosen for him before he was born.

When his time is up, he will leave the world with a soul full of pride, the pride of a husband, the pride of a father, the pride of a man.

Email Rich Strack at richiesadie11@gmail.com