It was Thursday night at the Foggy Notions bar and restaurant, and I always bring my camera to take a photo of Kelly Nolan, a strong and beautiful woman who looks he camera squarely in the eye and dares it to click. Kelly has never paused to fix her hair or turn to a good side, or blinked.

Of course, her smile says, this is me, this is who I am. Do it.

Taking her photo tonight, I felt a strong impulsion as we left the Bog, as it is known here. My inspirations for writing come like that. I told Maria I wanted to write about women. I admire strong women, I believe they are stronger than men I believe they are more spiritual and open. I believe they are more nurturing and empathetic.

I believe they are stronger than many men would dare admit. I seems to me it is an important time to be a woman, they are being challenged to come to terms with who they are and what they feel.

“I am no bird,” wrote Charlotte Bronte, “and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.”

I trust no man who degrades women, or treats them as objects of vanity.  I respect no man who uses and exploits them, or diminishes and patronizes them. Those kinds of men are not real men, they don’t know what a real man is. They are small in every way.

“Lock up  your libraries if you like,” said Virginia Woolf defiantly, “but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.”

I have a passion for strong women, and I know a bit of what I speak. I married one. I saw her cast aside the nets, find her independent will, unleash the freedom of her mind. I know how powerful they can be, and also how loving.

I am content with who I am, but most often men disappoint me.  I always want to be a better man than men.

I can’t help thinking of what the world would be without men, how much safer and peaceful it would be. How women would see Mother Earth bleed and try to nurture her to health.  I wait for the truly strong men, the real men, to come forward and think of women in a different way. It is their time now, their moment, we men have messed it up and are tearing up our world. It is time for us to get out of the way and ask for their help.

I want to be the man Anais Nin wrote about when she wrote: “I , with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, and does not doubt my courage and my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman.”

That is the man I want to be.

If I could reach out to men, if they would listen to me, if they would listen to anyone, I would tell them that I know how hard it is to be a man, even harder to be a good one. We only know what we see.

When I die, my wish is for my wife to turn to a friend and say of me: “he treated me like a woman.”

I think there is no higher compliment than that.

I look at Kelly Nolan doing her work, living her good life, speaking so lovingly of her children, handling her bar and tables with such grace and warmth. Like a woman.

I hope one day every man who sees the truth and presumes to lead us will have the courage to treat women like women.