As soon as I felt the tears creeping out of the corner of my eyes, I tried to stop them. Did everything I could to keep them from escaping the grasp of my iron irises and spilling out onto my face. But I couldn't stop them. The tears, they came. And now my entire world has been torn asunder. Am I really even a man? Will I be crying during Erin Alexander half-time interviews now (tears of joy excepted should she miraculously forget to wear her top)? When Flava-Flav chooses his new woman will I fall to the floor with arms outstretched to catch my gushing tears? Or when the Arena Football League Champion is crowned, will I crumble like the walls of Jericho? These are the fears that now encircle my mind. After all I've been through, am I really just a sissy?

In an effort to reclaim my manhood I set forth upon a rigorous physical self-examination:

1. Penis...check.
2. Lack of vagina...check.
3. Lack of breasts...no comment (see my man boobs discussion in The Jiggleable hour).
4. Lack of breasts capable of lactation...check
5. Metaphorical vagina... check.

Damn.

So then I tried to categorize the times I have cried in the past fifteen years (on a non-funeral related basis) to see if perhaps Reese Witherspoon and I have some cosmic connection from another life. These were the results:

1. I cried during the movie Big Fish.

2. I cried when Skull Squadron leader Roy Fokker died in Robotech Season 1.

   
And he didn't even finish the song for Claudia Grant

3. I cried when UT lost to Alabama in 1990.

4. At the age of eleven, I cried after a fight with my daycare nemesis Greg Wilson. (Note: Pursuant to elementary school yard fighting rules, these were classified as "fighting tears" and I am not sure if they technically count. Basically, I am uncertain whether fighting tears constitute a legitimate exclusion. I'd be interested in opinions.)

That is all. [ed: Clay cried at his wedding. We were there. Not that there's anything wrong with that.] Otherwise my face has been as dry as the Sahara at midday. (I have also eliminated crying from laughing so hard. For instance, I still tear up when I think about DJ being carried on the back of our high school art teacher after a soccer "injury.") Aside from perhaps also being located in Nashville at the same time as all of these crying events, Reese Witherspoon seems to have little in common with the cause.

So then, I did what lawyers everywhere are taught to do, I went to the text of Reese Witherspoon's Oscar acceptance speech. Actually lawyers everywhere are taught to go to the text and not to go to the text of Reese Witherspoon's Oscar acceptance speech. Although I do love the image of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's next opinion having a line like, "Since the fourth amendment is silent when it comes to specific language regarding whether heat-seeking searches of residences are allowed, I decided to parse the language of Reese Witherspoon's acceptance speech. When Reese said via June Carter Cash, "I'm just trying to matter." Oscars (Accepting an Oscar, Witherspoon, Reese March 6, 2006), what she clearly meant was it does matter and heat-seeking searches are unconstitutional."

Unfortunately, I could not find the text of the speech itself because no one pays attention to Oscar acceptance speeches unless you pledge your allegiance to Mongolia or announce you have frequent sex with ferrets. So I'm left absolutely bereft of understanding my tears. Which is a sort of bad ending for this column. So I'm going to continue it with a game diary of the Oscars that will be up later this week. Basically, I just had to come clean now. Somehow saying it out loud (and by saying it out loud I literally mean, writing it out quiet) makes me feel better. So here goes for the last time, "I cried during Reese Witherspoon's Oscar acceptance speech and now I don't think I am a man."