How to Manhandle a Stroller

Manhandle -

to handle in a manly way;

to handle, if a man;

to handle, if a man denying ownership

or responsibility

Tonight I took Mad Max out for his last chance of the day to go potty outside. A damp chill has settled on the neighborhood and there was a little mist in the air. EE was asleep, so that limited our radius. As I finished explaining out loud to Max that he needed to go poopoo and that we would stand in the side yard until he did, he started and looked behind me, so I did likewise. A large man dressed in a black t-shirt and black athletic shorts was striding up the sidewalk towards us with a folded up jogging stroller casually slung over his shoulder. Really, who does that? Who carries a stroller when you can push it? It is slightly creepy to push an empty stroller around, but not over-the-top creepy. The wheels looked intact. Then the answer occurred to me: he was manhandling it. You know, how a guy carries your purse: in his hand only, no looping around wrist or arm, and awkwardly away from his body (until the 3rd year of marriage, apparently--then he slings it over his shoulder like a natural). This was some sort of stroller delivery, and it probably wasn't his stroller. He probably doesn't have a kid. And he was manhandling it to prove all of this. Or perhaps because of all of this--men are mysterious, no?

I watched out of the corner of my eye as he shifted it uncomfortably from one shoulder to the other and continued past us over the crest of the hill. A few minutes later, having despaired of getting Max to poop on rough grass when he can poop on soft rugs, we turned to go inside. And the man was walking back whence he'd come, free of stroller encumbrance.

No, that's not really the definition of manhandle.