Saturday, October 12, 2019

Fuzzy Wuzzy Just Becausey

When I met Dave he had a beard. It wasn't the greatest beard of all time but we were all hippies back then and beards were just part of the package. He did have one of the finest heads of hair I'd ever seen. Long and glossy and spectacular. I believe the beard had less to do with fashion than a sincere desire to not get up every morning and scrape his face. I couldn't argue with that. But after a while, when I knew I was worth something to him, I did let on that it would be fun to see it trimmed up a bit.

He looks better with a trimmed beard. Most men do.

So we're going on 43 years now with me mentioning about twice a year that a little snip around the edges might be nice. One of the best things about him keeping his beard short is that it doesn't hide his neck, which is long and glossy and spectacular. He's not moved by this argument.

I've seen his face two or three times, when he had to shave his beard for work. I've still never seen his upper lip. He's got a dimple in his chin. What the hell. Mostly he used it to store facial hair, I guess, so it was a surprise to me. He always grew the beard out immediately and there'd be about a week or two when it was all sexy and short and then we're back in beardville again.

This is what comes of being a couple union blue-collar workers. We save oodles on wardrobe but some of us get scraggly in the beard region and some of us don't wear makeup or even, really, make an effort. Actually, all of that applies to both of us now.

In the last few years Dave went through another sexy phase wherein the top of his beard was dark and the bottom gray. That was a really nice year. Then it went straight to white and somewhere along the line that whole routine of trimming it up every six months whether it needed it or not went by the wayside. I offered to take a scissors to it myself, but somehow something else always came up, and then one day I realized we now have a situation. That situation being my husband has crossed over into Homeless Dude territory.
Note long glossy spectacular neck

But that also means, for the first time in his life, he's right spang in fashion. This is Portland. Portland men get their strength (which they are not allowed to show) from letting their beards grow. They don't shape them. They don't trim them. They want to see what they can produce, and they can never be sure until they've pushed out as much secondary sexual characteristic as their little hormones can manage.

Every now and then you see a splendid beard that is a marvel of architecture but the vast majority run somewhere between curious and repellent. Maybe they're so sparse the beard looks more like a vapor. Or a bad hedge. Or, frankly, pubic. There's an entire traveling ecosystem happening on the streets here. Nobody knows what's in those beards. Could be pizza. Could be Legos. Could be gerbils. And in that illustrious company, suddenly, Dave is looking kind of cool again. His beard is developing some internal shape, is not pubic, gets some wave action going, and is an appealing white rather than gray. Even I'm kind of interested in what else will happen. Right now it looks like his face is wearing a sweater. Down the line, he might develop a cable knit. He's a creative guy.

And I've just noticed, because beards are such a Thing now, that when we walk down the street, he sometimes gets a little personal nod from another bearded man. A little "Nice one, dude." An acknowledgment. A signal from the fraternity.

I don't want to take that away from him. I do miss his neck but Marge and Studley might need nesting material. And besides, the homeless dudes don't ask Dave for money anymore.

48 comments:

  1. I could not stop gaping at Dave's hair in the first picture; it is resplendent! And he probably did ~nothing~ to make it look that way, which makes me terribly jealous. I could get an expensive cut, use a plethora of pricey products, and spend an hour styling it and it would STILL not look that good. I am gobsmacked. Kudos, Dave... you lucky bastard....

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    1. "I could not stop gaping at Dave's hair in the first picture;"

      Are you sure that is where you were gaping??

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    2. As I don't have x-ray vision, and both his ~manly, strong~ arm and the bathwater was in the way... yeah... that's where I was gaping.

      That's my story, and I'm stickin' to it.

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    3. Sorry I recycled that photo--I don't have that many pictures of Dave from the '70s. When I met him his hair was about eight inches longer and made little corkscrew curls just at the bottom, all natch'l-like. With no split ends. I know.

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  2. The pictures say it all. But still a nice little write up.

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  3. Such a sweet sentimental look at your husband. I like that white beard too. This nod coming from the white hair sorority.

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  4. Before you know it, his beard will have gone and joined ZZ Top.

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    1. See, theirs are pubic. Maybe lengthwise, though...

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  5. The last time I saw my own bare face was 1980, although I may have had a mustache. I think I am afraid to look now as I may have aged a little. It is now mostly gray, too. Dragging an extremely sharp piece of steel over my throat every morning seemed barbaric at least and suicidal at most. I couldn't understand it. I have pictures from when I was mostly clean shaven, but then I still had hair on top of my head, too. We have long cold winters here and my face is happier when it is covered.

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    1. I haven't gotten a lot of thermal aid from my chin whiskers yet, but stay tuned.

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  6. "...there'd be about a week or two when it was all sexy and short..."

    This gave me a pang, a stab, a fire-poker of regret.
    My handsome, always clean-cut husband stopped cutting his hair a couple of years ago. We went through this before; he'd been job-hunting and getting shaggy, then, an opportunity came along, and he allowed that getting a nice haircut might boost his chances of making a good impression. We actually went on a "date" where I took pictures of him getting a haircut, then we went out to dinner. My, he looked nice. He got that job, too. He did well at it, and so the haircuts became fewer and farther between. I wished his employer would intervene but he didn't, or if he did, he got the same reaction I got: MYOB. So, he stopped being clean-cut. Now, he's retired and I'm afraid the homeless look is worsening. I need some kind of therapy re: accepting the things you cannot change. Isn't it sad when your spouse doesn't want to look at you?

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    1. Not to be cynical (well... maybe a little, but that's what affairs are for.

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    2. My GOODNESS! Aww. Yeah, I would think a person who otherwise didn't care about his appearance would make the sacrifice if it was important to his spouse. I mean, I would, for instance. But Dave never complains about how I look, and that's more a testament to him than to me.

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    3. Not to sound mean, Susan, but how about considering gratitude for what you do have? Imagine spouse being forever gone, and realizing that you'd love for them to be back, however they look? I remind myself of such when spouse exhibits annoying behaviors. Helps a lot. He certainly puts up with mine!

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    4. You always run the risk, there, though, that you imagine your spouse being forever gone, and then you think: I could live with that.

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  7. The man in my life has shaved his beard once in the 40 years that we have been together when we tried scuba diving and water kept getting into his diving mask. I regularly admit that I fell in love with his beard and long hair first. To which he replies some rubbish about falling for my eyes. As if. It was my at the time very long blond hair.

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    1. My main currency waaaay back then was long blond straight hair and tits. It sure as hell wasn't my eyes.

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  8. I have seen my partner's chin once in over forty years (the hospital shaved it to better fit an oxygen mask). It is untrimmed and not to my taste - but it is his face.

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    1. On the other hand, if it's your face you don't have to look at it. So.

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  9. We've got the same thing going on here! I have no idea when The Husband last shaved his face or cut his hair. He would fit right in there in Portland. The fact that he is a dumpster diver and often wears t-shirts he found in said dumpsters pretty well completes the homeless person look. And I - like you - don't wear make-up or make much of an effort - plus gave up my own shaving efforts when I was a hippie and never went back to it - nowadays it seems to be completely a non-issue. Although, I do try to look clean when I'm going into town... Over the course of our almost 48 years together his facial hair has been a neatly trimmed goatee, a sexy stubble, just a mustache, or completely gone. The hair on his head has been long, nicely trimmed, or sometimes buzz cut - and everywhere in between.

    Also - I too gaped at that first picture!

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  10. I live in Amish country. ‘Nuff said.

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  11. I've been cutting my husband's hair for a few years now so if he looks bad it's my fault!!

    Dave really does have magnificent hair, head and facial. Some white hair can look dingy, but definitely not his!

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    1. His head hair isn't as special as it once was, so it's fun to see the beard hair is making up for it.

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  12. I have always said that a beard can tickle in the nicest places.

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  13. I have always known Jerry with a beard. Hair on the other hand has been back and forth. When he went to work for Western Electric his first work partner wore a buzz cut and hassled him so much Jerry didn't trim his hair for two years... just cuz. I do like a beard. Much softer touch than stubble as far as I'm concerned...

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    1. Jerry would totally not trim his hair just out of contrariness. Dave too.

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  14. And just for any outsiders reading this comment, if that was Murr's currency, back then many considered her to be a millionaire. Heck even our despairingly closeted high school English teacher had to run his hands through that gorgeous hair...

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    1. Ohh! How nice! And did you know, Ed, that it wasn't until I told that story to Dave and mentioned his name was Harry Tuell and he burst out laughing, I didn't realize it was funny?

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  15. OK. Man here. I grow a beard every fall for the cold months, shave it off in the spring on the day I look in the mirror and say, "Jesus you look like an old bastard." But it is white. I do trim it, and have even had some compliments. I have not seen my upper lip in, like 50 years, though. And here's an interesting observation: Every year when I shave it off...no one notices! Not even Betty, my wife of almost 50 years. Some people say things like, "Hmmm. Did you grow a mustache?" or, "What? What's different?" But almost no one says, "Oh hey, I notice you shaved your beard." I take this as a compliment. My amazing good looks just outshine the accoutrements. ( Hah!)

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  16. Beard - no problem.
    Smooth shave - no problem
    Stubble? Go away.That just shows a lazy, slovenly character.

    There were some glorious manes around in the hippie era, weren't there?

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    1. I suppose you don't care for the deliberate 4th-day beard they get when they set their razors high like on a lawn mower?

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    2. Not if they want to get smoochy-close!

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  17. Oh my, what a gorgeous young man Dave was and I almost swooned at the hair. I prefer a trimmed beard too, maybe just an inch long or the three day growth type. But Dave's current white thatch is quite nice, well shaped and decently thick. and he is still handsome. I still think it's unfair of Mother Nature to give some men far better hair than most women; couldn't she even things up and give everyone great hair?

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    1. The rest of us have to work on our personalities. That's not so bad.

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  18. Oh that is one splendid white beard! Internal shape, indeed. That's what makes it so interesting and compelling.

    I'm off to tweeze a few of my own white beard hairs now.

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    1. I have two main ones and it's sure hard to locate them in my tweezers without a mirror. I am thinking about running a razor over my upper lip though. I don't use it for anything else, so...

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  19. My husband's grandmother told me about the time her husband (husband's grandfather) grew a mustache. It came in red; the hair on his head was not red. She hated the mustache and he would not shave it off. During one night, while he was sound asleep, she used her needlepoint scissors and carefully snipped off just one side of the mustache. Fortunately, he did shave the other half off, although I think he must have been tempted to leave it there to annoy her.

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  20. Dave's head and chin of hair when younger was magnificent. His current white nest is a wonder as well.
    I have had various combinations of beards, mustaches, goatees and heads of hair from shaved, neat, flowing over my shoulders (not so very long ago), and getting a permanent that resembled an Afro (more in the distant past). Beards mostly did not suit me, but I did enjoy the long tresses (but not the wash, dry, brush routines that went along with it). Like Dave, I like the minimal care approach.

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    1. You see, if you're doing it right, you can have the long tresses AND skip the routines. Never underestimate the joys of lowering your standards.

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  21. i am ERIC BRUNT by name. Greetings to every one that is reading this testimony. I have been rejected by my wife after three(3) years of marriage just because another Man had a spell on her and she left me and the kid to suffer. one day when i was reading through the web, i saw a post on how this spell caster on this address AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com have help a woman to get back her husband and i gave him a reply to his address and he told me that a man had a spell on my wife and he told me that he will help me and after 3 days that i will have my wife back. i believed him and today i am glad to let you all know that this spell caster have the power to bring lovers back. because i am now happy with my wife. Thanks for helping me Dr Akhere contact him on email: AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com
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    i am ERIC BRUNT by name. Greetings to every one that is reading this testimony. I have been rejected by my wife after three(3) years of marriage just because another Man had a spell on her and she left me and the kid to suffer. one day when i was reading through the web, i saw a post on how this spell caster on this address AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com have help a woman to get back her husband and i gave him a reply to his address and he told me that a man had a spell on my wife and he told me that he will help me and after 3 days that i will have my wife back. i believed him and today i am glad to let you all know that this spell caster have the power to bring lovers back. because i am now happy with my wife. Thanks for helping me Dr Akhere contact him on email: AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com
    or
    call/whatsapp:+2349057261346

    ReplyDelete