I got this creative and mysterious note mailed to me today by an anonymous reader, it was a homemade paper flower in a pot with a note that said: “you so don’t know what a good man you are. But we all know. Thanks for all you do!”

The letter was unsigned, there was no legible postmark on the envelope, I had no idea who the sender was, I’m guessing it was something a woman would have thought to say and send.

It was a very sweet note and card, and I thank the sender, whoever it is and wherever they are. I loved the paper flower.

I don’t know who sent it, but I did get the feeling she knows me, it is true that I do not have a sense in my own consciousness that I am a “good” man, I do not think of myself in that way. I see me as a person who is striving to be good, to do good, to be better, after nearly sending my own life up in flames.

I’m not being falsely modest, that is honestly the way I see myself.

I agree with the prophet who wrote that the first step to being a good man is to deeply feel the burden of the stones someone else is carrying around. To me, good comes from selflessness and empathy, it is not for me to say how good  I am or am not. I think that if I thought of myself in that way, I would have no reason to keep working on myself.

We all have our battles to fight. Women seem to know that, I wonder if men do.

I have a friend who feels almost continuously sorry for himself and expects sympathy and pity from everyone he knows.

He lost someone he loves, was abused and was divorced. He asked me if I knew anyone who had suffered as much as he has, and he seems to bear the sorrows of the world on his shoulders. He has no sense that pain is inevitable in life, but suffering is a choice.

I answered that everyone I know on this earth over 20 has suffered as much as he has and more. I lost two children, was abused and was divorced. Like everyone else, I’ve to know grief and disappointment. I haven’t heard from him since. I make a lousy friend to a person like that.

I would be horrified if people pitied me, or if I forgot for one second that almost everyone I know or know of has lost friends, dogs, jobs, lovers, and sometimes, hope. When people tell me n long messages how awful it was to lose a dog, I often wonder if they really don’t know that me and everyone reading this has lost a dog, or a person, or both.

I have always believed that a “good man” is a man who sees strength in empathy, and honor in supporting family and friends, and in protecting the needy and the vulnerable. I have always believed that feminism benefits men every bit as much as it benefits women and that freedom and happiness makes all of us stronger.

The old idea of men is collapsing of its own awful weight, killing men in countless numbers, and crushing still more. We can just hope they don’t take the world down with them.

I very much embrace Author and Cultural Critic Bell Hooks idea of what the world needs from men, expressed so eloquently in her book, The Will To Change: Masculinity, and Love:

“What the world needs now is liberated men who are ’empathetic and strong, autonomous and connected, responsible to self, to family and friends, to society, and capable of understanding how those responsibilities are, ultimately, inseparable.’ Men need feminist thinking. It is the theory that supports their spiritual evolution and their shift away from the patriarchal model. Patriarchy is destroying the well-being of men, taking their lives daily.”

This is the time for good men, I think, to define themselves by how they live. Feminism is for everyone. It’s time for me to define what goodness is, I hope my anonymous admirer is correct about me. My life will tell.

Every time I look at the mayhem in Washington, I see the desperate need for good men to support the great shift to a gentler, more peaceful, equal and human world. I think that’s my idea of “good,” and I thank the kind person who prodded me to think about it.