Actually, most men are good.

In which I answer a friend's pressing question.

“How do you manage to have such healthy relationships with men when you’ve been sexually assaulted four times?” a friend of mine asked.

“I think it’s because I’ve had so many good men in my life, boyfriends and others,” I replied, without hesitation. It’s not like I hadn’t thought about it. “Actually, most men are good.”

Flashback to eighth grade. A lot of difficult things were going on in my little 5’1.5” life (I am 5’2” now because I grew half an inch more thanks to yoga, but that was my height in eighth grade.)

The things that were difficult for me in eighth grade could have soured any young women on the concept of men. The details need not detain us. But one reality was clear: my middle school boyfriends were awesome.

Chris and Christian. I don’t think they’ll mind me mentioning their names. They were best friends, and we were a quadruple best friendship with me and my friend Sara. Seventh grade, I dated Christian and she dated Chris. Eighth grade, we switched. She dated Christian and I dated Chris. All were happy.

My memories of the boys of middle school are great. I went to a magnet school for academically gifted and artistic (not autistic but I’m sure we had plenty) kids, and we agreed to be bussed in for an hour into the inner city to go to a special public school for smart kids. There, we met those of our own kind. I discovered that I was (and am) queen of the nerds.

Of course we fumbled around in basements watching “Top Gun” and “Dirty Dancing” and finding out where… things… are. We had a few misunderstandings, but a lot more fun.

What I remember most is the hours and hours of conversation on the phone, real genuine conversation, about music, poetry, what we were reading, love, life, who we wanted to be… all with my boyfriends. All men who grew up to be fine husbands, fathers, and creators of their own.

Back in those days, in about 1987, Amy Grant’s “Stay for Awhile” was a favorite song of me and my best friend Sara. She played in concert with Ms. Grant and sent me an autographed tape of her collection. “You were no more than a child, but then so was I, young and tender. Time carries on, I guess it always will. But deep inside my heart, time stands still.”

We had a wonderful experience of boys, that informed my later experience of men. I remember one of Sara’s boyfriends telling me he would fight for her. Fortunately he didn’t have to (though if the fight had been in the form of violin challenges, he would have won!)

Time went on, and time took its toll on me. Bad things happened. When I have written and rewritten this piece in my mind, I have debated telling the details of my sexual assaults.

But as I thought of detailing these horrors I realized the obvious, the obvious that is obscured by our current culture: I should not have to prove my credibility as someone who has survived sexual assault in order to make a case for why I like men. How twisted can things be when you feel like you have to prove you’ve been hurt by men, and suffered, to feel you can defend them?

My college boyfriends were amazing men, two of whom are state court judges now, all of whom treated me with love, respect, kindness, and as an equal. We grew together as young Yalies in an era when gender roles were confusing. I am sometimes sad that I hit the college scene at just the time when I was broke and men thought that paying for dates was not PC, so I paid for way too many of my own slices of pizza. But the conversations I had over those slices I’d never trade. Conversations with good men who valued me for my whole self: body, brains, sense of humor, especially when I was cracking on them.

It was a joy to attend their weddings, to see pictures of their children. I have been there as a friend at divorces too. I have rarely burned a bridge with an ex - if I loved you then, why would I not love you now? I seem to be the woman who understands.

I have a lot of male energy myself, and I’ve gotten in a fair amount of trouble for it. I get things done, I prefer to do rather than talk about, and I’m not just assertive, I’m aggressive. If you want a good laugh and are willing to let me buy you a drink or a cup of coffee, I’ll tell you funny stories of men I met in recovery meetings. I am not the pliable, pathetic little recovery girl who is the fantasy of every leader of recovery whatever on Tuesday night.

I like men. The person who knows me best in the world recently said, “You’re good for men.” I am. I don’t hold the entire half of the species responsible for a few bad actors. I see the position they’ve been put in: supposed to provide, be strong, but not demand a damn thing. No sex after the kids are born? Supposed to be fine! Call the question with the woman who has flirted with you off the hook? Bad idea. Friends of mine have lost their careers because women have accused them of sexual harassment in a situation where I’m sorry sister, but you started it, and you need to let it go. I’ve been genuinely sexually harassed and that requires an employment or quasi-employment relationship and a threat - a casual come on or a consensual relationship are not the same.

I wonder what price I will pay for publishing this. Mark’s book is next to me. I will not be silent again.

Most men are good. Most men are trying to figure out how to please women! Most men are trying to do their best. I have cleaned up the mess of the gender wars for most of my last twenty or so years. By the time you see normal men truly afraid to engage in making out, you’ve got to realize there’s an issue.

A lawyer friend introduced me to the concept of “enthusiastic consent.” I’ve learned that it is necessary to not quite but almost sign and notarize a document before engaging in a first kiss.

But I have not given up on the first kiss that is neither signed nor notarized. That is perhaps a forgone conclusion, for all who are watching. I have not given up on those first few shallow breaths before you don’t stop. That first kiss, the sum total of just knowing, beyond the rules that have held us back for so long.

I’m listening to an Amy Grant song called “Deep As It Is Wide.”

“Every breath taking me closer

Every step leading to paradise

They say the faithful get to go there

I believe there’s love deep as it is wide.”

I’ve been there. I’ve seen it. I’ve breathed it. You have too. I believe in it.

They say the faithful get there. Maybe they’re right.