Nebraska Punter Archie Wilson Put on a Clinic for How Grown Men are Supposed to Cry
Meet 19 year old Archie Wilson, the Nebraska Cornhuskers new punter prospect. Wilson played Australian Rules Football in his native land. He's an ambidextrous kicker, though his left leg is the more dominant. And the media in Omaha have wasted no time and spared no hyperbole to dub him The Most Interesting Man in the World. So take THAT, Elon Musk. It's going take a lot more than rescuing stranded astronauts, hooking computers up to human brains and getting us to Mars to wrestle that title away from a two-footed college special teamer.
But the reason Wilson is making headlines isn't his dexterity, nationality, or his willingness to say "Hi" to a local news camera crew. It's for his reaction to a question about being so far from home for the first time:
That part is hard... I'm sorry.
Yeah I love them a lot. I have two little brothers and a mom and a dad and that's the tough part about being here. I love them a lot and I miss them.
But they know this is what's best for me and it's good I can still talk to them plenty over the phone. They're coming here to see the first few games so I am looking forward to that.
Crying among grown men is a complicated issue. In the normal course of things, I would recommend not crying in public whenever possible. Or as Ron Swanson put it in his Pyramid of Greatness, "CRYING: Acceptable at funerals and the Grand Canyon." In the past four years, I've had experience at both. I would also suggest it's acceptable at military flyovers during the National Anthem, when a baby is born, and the last act of Miracle when Kurt Russell as Herb Brooks goes under the stands and breaks down. If fact, if you can resist turning on the waterworks during any of these moments, I suggest calling an exorcist, because there's probably a demon where your soul should be.
And when it's necessary, there are right ways for a man to cry:
The "I'm Spartacus!" tear:
The Iron Eyes Cody tear:
… the most successful ad campaign of all time, which did more to clean up America's highways than generations of losers working off their court-ordered community service.
Also the tear you shed at the grave of the man who gave his life for you after you saved the entire world from tyranny:
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And telling some young lad that your dad is your hero:
Then there's the wrong way to cry.
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Also see every man on every episode of The Bachelor/Bachelorette sobbing under any circumstances. Absolutely unacceptable.
But finding yourself thousands of miles from home, away from the warm embrace of kith and kin for the first time in your life? Missing your loved ones and homesick for your native land? This is acceptable if you're OK with charming the Cornhuskers merch off of every coed on campus and making every MILF in the stands think about ditching her dull husband with his low Emotional IQ so she can be your mommy for one night. Which I have to imagine is going to be the reaction to this video all across Nebraska, even though that was not Wilson's intention.
More to the point, this is how you do it, when it has to be done. He lost his composure, but quickly regained it, rallied, and answered the question. Like a man. If he'd started sobbing into his t-shirt like like a child, you might take issue. But nope. Wilson stoically solidered on in a way that would've make Marcus Aurelius himself proud.
So here's to him and the entire Wilson family. Here's hoping he lives up to the legend he's already built around himself with his feet and his heart.