Natural Born Grillers

Pyromaniacs: that’s what they are, these creatures we commonly refer to as the opposite sex. Fire starting is encoded in the Y chromosome, so that for men, the need to engage in activities involving open flame, fireworks and explosives is almost primal.

According to Jim Benning, contributor to MSN Lifestyle, this urge dates back eons ago, when our Neanderthal forebears, known among grilling scholars as homo erectus barbacoas, grew tired of dining on raw meat, night after endless night. So they retreated into their caves, threw their saber-toothed tiger rumps and wooly mammoth thighs onto their open-flame hearths and never looked back. These early grilling endeavors led to the discovery of the art of conversational speech. Men realized that speech didn’t always have to be utilitarian. Since they had to stand around waiting for the meat to cook, they discussed mundane matters, like the events of the day, to make time seem shorter.

Primitive grilling has since evolved into a common suburban pastime, a widely accepted forum wherein men connect with one another, beers in hand, ribbing each other about their just-concluded golf games, the disastrous loss by a favorite sports team, the neighbor’s hot wife who wears next to nothing, their ever-expanding midsections, or their receding hairlines.
It is summer once again and the buzzword among my friends’ husbands is “barbeque time!” Read as: “Hey honey, buy the meat and the booze, bring the friends over, and watch me make a real fire!”

I’ve been to several since the beginning of March, and have quietly observed these men around their grills. Let me tell you, they do get extremely territorial. The exercise of igniting a grill becomes almost ceremonial. There’s much fussing about charcoal or gas; there’s the rolling of old newspaper that serves as kindling for the flame; there’s that manic fanning of the embers until they ignite. If it all doesn’t work, the frustration usually leads to some angry dousing with lighter fluid accompanied by a variety of cuss words, as though the manhood of the fire starter were in question. There’s a barrage of volunteering from the circle of testosterone-filled bodies all-too-willing to assume the supreme post of igniter. But always, the man of the house — the grill king — must hold his post. He strikes a match and everyone watches with bated breath as he throws it onto the waiting pit. Of a sudden, FLASH! BOOM! Houston, we have fire! Applause and hoots erupt from the men folk. There are congratulatory words, pats on the back, and multiple swigs of beer. It is a triumph! The host’s manhood has been validated!

At one of the parties, the host, who of course was manning the grill, sidled over to the cooler to fetch himself another beer. One of the male guests let himself be useful and turned over some of the steaks that were searing on the coals. When the barbeque king saw this, he was livid. “You moved the steaks? You took my tongs? Who told you to do that?” Because of his booming voice and impassioned delivery, the words actually sounded more like “Uga buga, uga buga,” to those gathered around. Well, it might as well have been that — there wasn’t much difference in content or context. What he was upset about was the intrusion upon his domain. I bet if the unsuspecting guest took liberties with his wife, he would have reacted in the same way, mouthing “Uga buga!”

Barbeque grill and wife: equally precious, equally irreplaceable, equally worth killing someone over. But then again, the "wife" part might be questionable to some men...

My brother, the calmest person on the planet, who doesn’t get fazed or excited by anything, called me during the Christmas holidays, hyperventilating over the phone. “Come over, now, right now!”

So I panicked: “Why?”

“Just come now!”

So I rushed over. And what do you know? He didn’t get into an accident, didn’t have a coronary, wasn’t burglarized, or beaten up by his wife. He had purchased one of those gargantuan Weber barbeque grills as a Christmas present to himself — the ones they advertise on TV. “Man, that’s a mother!” was my initial reaction.

His reply was, “Yup; and it’s my mother.” He was intimately caressing the shimmering, metallic black-painted contraption with state-of-the-art silver fittings as he said this. He actually seemed like Vanna White from Wheel of Fortune or one of those showcase girls on The Price is Right who wave their arms enticingly and run their fingers lovingly over the products on display. Except that my brother is a 200-pound hulk of a man with fingers that can make a German schüblig look like it was on the South Beach diet. He proceeded to lecture me on the merits of this monster Weber grill with half a dozen burners and electronic igniters, equipped with an infrared, rear-mounted rotisserie burner, featuring so many hundred square inches of prime cooking area, and which can produce temperatures of up to 500 degrees — 500 degrees! Can you believe that?

“Shucks!” I said. “It’s a city!”

“Oh, no; not a city. More like a funeral parlor,” he retorted with the unapologetic pride of a terrorist. “Things die in there,” he added with a smirk.

“Sure, Jason Bourne,” I humored him.

He was tripping over himself in excitement, saying, “Here, look, it’s amazing.” He opened the dome to reveal three tiers — I repeat: three tiers — of grilling space. “Whatcha think? Huh? Huh? Whaddya say?”

“I’m speechless.” I shrugged my shoulders, contemplating whether this was my cue to start jumping up and down as a show of support and affection for him.

“Ha! Thought so! Okay, let’s get some fire started!”

At first I thought that he kind of overreacted; but then, if I were the new owner of a shiny, red alligator Kelly bag, I would act the same way, and even throw in a rain dance for good measure.

I’ve wondered what it is about grilling that gets men all worked up and emotional. I figured it must be the element of danger and that reconnection to the primal instinct for survival shared with their caveman predecessors — those hunter-gatherers who faced death each day, killing animals violently to ensure the survival of their kin, then squatting in front of an open fire, content to have lived to see yet another day.

Nowadays, about all the action and the violence men experience comes courtesy of their flat-screen plasma TVs. And so if they’ve got a pit, a breeze, a flame, lighter fluid, a miniature pitchfork and a predominantly male audience imbibing alcohol, they’ve got the best setting for the celebration of manhood. Oh, about the danger issue — there’s that chance they might singe their eyebrows, but hey, that’s all part of the game — survival of the fittest, right? But the real danger, I believe, is to the ego. If that fire doesn’t come out big and furious, the ego deflates just a little; hence all the effort to come up with a blazing backyard inferno.

Benning says, “Barbequeing allows us men to express a repressed yearning — that instinctual urge that Sigmund Freud so aptly called men’s ‘Q complex.’ It links us to a simpler time. Making that connection is healthy. It’s good for us.”

Grilling and barbequing are, in a way, symbols of our postmodern condition. Men yearn to return to a simpler time, before cooking meat became so impossibly complicated. They may never return to that era of primitive culinary practices, but for a few hours on a summer day with clear skies, they try. It is the perfect expression of their inner Neanderthal and a fulfillment of their role as providers and protectors.

For this alone, they have every right to enjoy this seemingly frivolous pleasure. At least during summer. So, let it burn, baby!