SOFT EYES, STRONG SPINE, subtitled “A Guide to Life and Kids from a Divorced Dad,” is harder to categorize than it looks. Author Eric Brockman’s discourse ranges widely from personal anecdote to self-help advice, but always with the same goal in mind: equip fathers to more congenially and consistently inhabit their parental role—to their (and their children’s) advantage.
Brockman focuses, among other things, on “The fears that men admit out loud,” as opposed to “the quieter ones—the strange, body-level jolts that make no logical sense, the ones we hide because we don’t even know how to explain them.” Much of what he has to say is based on his understanding of the ways in which our societal concept of masculinity has skewed men’s emotional reactions. Little of this learned behavior is ever intended; as he notes, “you become what you spend time around.” His redefinition of masculinity is simple: being the alpha male at all costs is not incompatible with attentiveness to the needs of others. He points out, “You can be firm and still be compassionate. You can push and still be human. You can demand excellence without humiliating people to get it.”
There is nothing here that is particularly new or revelatory, but Brockman is a likeable narrator. He admits to his own failings with honesty, and compares the “1.0” version of himself (always running through life, never fully in the moment) with the “2.0” version. Instead of upbraiding his children for minor infractions, such as being late, Brockman pursued a more laid-back approach that paid dividends in the guise of building a more understanding and tolerant father-child relationship. These life lessons are illustrated by a great number of stories and anecdotes.
Brockman’s liberal use of euphemism can grate. For example, references to the “invisible audience” would strike home far more effectively if the term were explicitly defined, rather than letting the reader arrive at their own conclusions. But SOFT EYES, STRONG SPINE does a public service in encouraging fathers’ self-reflection during a period when it's arguably more difficult to be a dad than at any other time in living memory.
Vividly told and brimming with anecdotes, Eric Brockman's SOFT EYES, STRONG SPINE: A Guide to Life and Kids from a Divorced Dad speaks well to the contradictions that many men brought up to believe in conventional masculinities face when becoming fathers.
~ Craig Jones for IndieReader