FACIAL HAIR TODAY

FACIAL HAIR TODAY, GONE TOMORROW

So I’ve started growing a beard.

Well, not a beard, per se, because that would imply that I will have facial hair all around my face, but because of my boyish facial nature, that simply ain’t happening. So I guess I’m going to grow a goatee, which these days are worn by 19-year-olds who want to say, “Hey! Look at me! I’m can grow facial hair!” Showoffs.

This is an interesting experiment for me, because I have never even so much as made an attempt to cultivate the massive crop of facial hair that is undoubtedly hiding out under my skin. I didn’t start shaving until well into my senior year in high school, and since that time I haven’t gone more than a few days without shaving. I always thought that shaving was going to be the ultimate entrée into manhood – the bridge that I crossed from little boy to rugged man. Turns out it was merely an avenue for extensive bleeding.

But I shaved regularly nonetheless. Well, regular for me. I understand that some people shave every day. President Richard Nixon used to shave twice a day. Granted, that was because he was a werewolf. But the point is, most people shave a lot more often than I do. On average, I have to shave about three times per week. But all that is about to change, as I journey down the path to bearddom.

I started out thinking I would go ahead and make a run at a full beard. On the third day, I started closely examining the facial hair that was growing, and it wasn’t pretty. I think I may be part Calico or something, because there were all kinds of colors going on in my beard. A little red, a touch of gray (kinda depressing), and some blondish-brown. Not pretty stuff. Plus, I started trying to imagine myself with a full beard. Not pretty. Don’t believe me? Go grab a pen and color in a beard on me. I look like a 7-year-old dressing up as Sigmund Freud for Halloween.

And let’s not forget the itching. Oh, the incessant itching. How in the world people get full beards is amazing. They must have no itch receptors or something. I was this close to ripping my skin off early on in the experiment.

So I decided that the full beard was not going to happen. Besides, traditionally, the only people with full beards are Vikings, Lumberjacks, and God, and I didn’t fit into any of those categories. I settled on the goatee for the main fact that the only other kind of beard-type thing I could think of was a Fu Manchu mustache, and that’s just asking to get yourself karate chopped.

So, four days into the great beard experiment, I shaved around my nicely cultivated goatee. That in and of itself was a bit of a challenge. I had always shaved the whole face. I didn’t have to worry about keeping things even or anything because everything was coming off. Not so when you’ve got a budding goatee! I had to make sure that the sides were even, and the bottom was straight as can be. I had to make sure that perfect symmetry reached my fledgling beard, lest the experiment crash and burn from the start.

After probably the longest shaving experience of my life, I examined my young, upstart go-getter goatee. And, you may be asking, how did it look? Well, let me put it this way: it looks like I really need to wash my face. Apparently, my facial hair does a good job of lying low when it comes to joining as one and serving as a beard. So it looks like my face is kinda dusty, and could maybe use a wet rag.

To make sure I was maximizing my goatee efforts, I decided that I would go to the most reliable source in the world for anything and everything: the internet. There, I found a website (www.goatee.org) that offered this interesting tidbit: “’Many guys with perfectly healthy testosterone levels can't grow decent facial hair.” Well, at least I know I can still call myself a guy if this doesn’t work.

I got a few extra tips at the site (“In many parts of the world, especially the Middle East, you'll actually command more respect than you would if you were clean-shaven.” Look out Bahrain!) I am clearly well on my way in the journey. This time next week, I may have a massive, uncontrollable goatee, rivaling the famed fuzz of Mark McGwire or Buffalo Bill Cody or even Mr. Miagi. More than likely, however, I will only look dirtier.