Since another one started it, namely Retired in Delaware, let's continue discussing beards.
That's my current beard over on the left. I'm a "gray-beard". My mother thinks it makes me look old. Well, truth-be-told, ma, I am old. Frankly I fear I might look a whole lot older beneath the beard. Who knows what those whisker hide.
I guess it raises the question why I grew one. It wasn't a vanity-thing and it wasn't some childhood want. I don't remember thinking about facial hair one way or the other as a boy. Closest I got back then was long sideburns. I didn't much like mustaches as a youth, though I did have a lip carpet occasionally over my life.
I thought about getting a tattoo when I was a teen, but never did and given I have a strong dislike of needles it isn't likely I ever will. I thought about getting a motorcycle when I was a teen as well, but never did. Given my age and what that can do to the fragility of bones, I don't think I'll be buying a hog in the future either.
I never thought about a beard as a teen, but that I got.
I had a beard a couple times before. It was kind of a whim back then, but I discovered something very interesting when I grew one. I got noticed and not in a bad way. I'd go to a department store counter with a crowd, for instance, and I'd get immediately waited upon; strange but true.
I got rid of the beard when I went to work for the bank and I didn't grow it again until a few years after the bank requested I retire for being too old. Being clean-shaven didn't help me there.
Problem is I have this thinned out skin from the blasted psoriasis. I couldn't shave anymore without out drawing several lines of blood. My face always looked like I wrapped it in barbed-wire every morning. I just got tired of ritual self-mutilation every day and quick shaving. No one seems to mind. My wife says she likes my beard.
Here are some images of past facial foliage.
Now, I have managed to write something again. Send me some comments to cheer me up.
4 comments:
Glad you're back Lar! I was getting worried.
Keep your beard. It is you. As I said more than once, you have that "Donald Sutherland" look. That's good. He has a white beard.
Bill tells me that my white beard makes me look old. Well.....I am old. Your Mom said your beard makes you look old. Well.....you are REALLY OLD now. Happy birthday dear friend! 69 years old. Now that is something to celebrate. Look at how many people you have outlived. Not only personal friends and relatives but famous people like JFK, Elvis, James Dean and Buddy Holly (you weren't expecting Buddy in that panalopy of famous people were you?)
Like you, I notice that I get NOTICED when I have a beard. Without a beard I'm just another faceless non entity in the crowd.
I'm also growing my beard because my face is starting to sag. The beard covers it up nicely. Plus, when I color my beard it highlights my deep blue eyes, one of my best features.
Good to have you back Lar!
Your friend of 65 plus years (how many is it exactly anyway?).
Ron
We met in Miss Ezra's third grade class at East Ward. This was in January 1950. We quickly became friends by trading comic books. We have been friends for 60 years plus some months now.
Well, Happy Belated Birthday!! Yours is now past and mine is coming up...which means my depression is yet to come! Only I can't grow a beard. And I don't want a motorcycle...guess I'll have to get a tattoo!
Did that cheer you up?! Keep the beard...shaving is overrated - although is does a nice job of exfoliating the skin! (Said the Master Esthetician!)
'My wife says she likes my beard.;
That is very important, Larry.
Please take care.
I had a professor that had a white hair, mustache and beard. For some reason during his lectures I kept thinking about a bucket of chicken.
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