Digging for Words

In "Digging," Seamus Heaney depicts the speaker of the poem to be different from the other male members of his family to show the internal conflict he feels.
At the beginning of the poem, the speaker looks at his father digging through his window. Already, the speaker has a "squat pen rest[ing] between [his] finger and [his] thumb" while he watches his father do manual work outside. The speaker watches his father work rather then helping him.
Then towards the middle of the poem, the speaker mentions how "the old man could handle a spade./ Just like his old man." This shows that digging for potatoes is a family tradition that comes with respect.  So by not helping his father dig, the speaker is breaking a family tradition.
Finally, towards at the end of the poem, the speaker has "no spade to follow men like them" but "between [his] finger and [his] thumb/ The squat pen rests./ [He'll] dig with it." He is accepting he won't be able to carry on the tradition of digging because it is just not what he wants to do. Instead, the speaker will do his own digging by writing with his pen. This solves his internal conflict.