Image: AI generated cartoon of a man shaving
As a man who has had a beardish thing on my face since I started growing facial hair at 47, I am not qualified to address this topic, but since that has never stopped me before, why start now? And truthfully, there was about a month when I only had a mustache, and several years with a goatee, so I have actually handled a razor. Actually, I am not one of those men who believe my beard should just run right into my chest hair like a head-on collision, so I do shave every day, I just don't cover that much real estate.
I have to admit that I like my facial hair. I actually turned down a job in the mid 1980s because I would have been required to be clean shaven. I've never quite come to an understanding if I loved my beard that much or if I hated the idea of that job so much that I used my beard as an excuse.
You might ask why I have never attempted life without a beard (you might not, but as addressed above, that doesn't stop me.) I inherited the worst mix of possible genes from my ancestors. I got my body from my mom's dad, a six-foot tall, three-hundred-pound German engineer who emigrated to the States in 1929. And from my dad's dad (a five foot nine 160- pound salesman) I inherited the Smith chin, euphemistically known as a weak chin. I say euphemistically because weak chin is the technical term for having a freakishly large overbite.
Writer's Note: Whenever you can string together a sentence or two and use euphemistically twice--or three times--in a space of less than 40 words, you will impress the 25% of readers who understand what euphemistically (4 times!) means and the 2% who will look it up, but the remaining 73 percent will just think you are trying to show off. Those statistics are just made up, by the way. I believe in transparency.
The thing is, our presidents sit at the Resolute desk, and I live with a dissolute* chin.
*degenerate, immoral, depraved, debauched, self-indulgent. Just helping 73% of you out.
When I was in my late twenties I worked at a design/remodel firm and one of the owners was an interior designer. Judy had a print hanging on the wall (it never sold. I'm not sure why, I would have bought it) of some nameless ancestor (of mine). It was a painting of a hunter, circa blunderbuss days, leaning against a fence, gun in one hand, powder horn in the other, a group of hunting dogs at his feet, and the Smith chin on his face. I was convinced we were related. That chin told you immediately that this guy was a flake, probably drank too much, and would rather spend his days out in the woods than working. (Sorry Andy but doing surveys for the Forest Service can't be called work.)
I have, euphemistically, run out of words. I am certain, however, that I have proven the central thesis of this post - that I am not qualified to write about this topic. 'Til next time.
Win a free Kindle edition of Love: a novel of grief and desire: I work with Reader's Favorite on the Kindle book giveaway. If you go to readersfavorite.com/book-giveaway you can sign up for the monthly giveaway. You can scroll through the list of giveaways (over 500 each month) or sort the list by title or author to find Love: a novel of grief and desire and put your name in for this month's drawing. Good luck!
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