I have been feeling a little bit like Ray Lamontagne lately. Maybe a little bit of Dave Grohl (that dude is extremely talented, btw). Although I have made an effort this year to be more pro-active with my guitar playing and learning, that is not the similarity to these rockers that I have been feeling. I decided to grow a beard. San Diego doesn’t get that cold in winter, but its a fun thing to do to try and stay warm.
Growing hair is an ocean wave that tosses between tediously annoying, and exhiliratingly fun. Sometimes you have to wade through the annoying and ugly times, to enjoy the fun trancedent times. Maybe this is too philosophical for a snide about facial hair.
The last time that I grew my face out, I trimmed my mustache so that it would remain above my lip. This time I decided for the walrus bushy look to my mustache as I have let it grow as long as it can, and it covers both of my lips even. This has caused some difficulties. When I sip water from a stryofoam cup while at my desk, minutes later I will feel water dripping down my lip and chin. The mustache just gets in the way. I will go out to a neighborhood bar for a Guinness and I will have a beer lip from the froffy head of the delicious beer.
But far and away the most difficult part is when I have to open my mouth wide to take a bite of something, most often, a delicious sandwich, or a rustic salad. I will open my mouth, go to take a bite, and as I bite down I will grip my mustache hair between my sandwich and my sharp teeth. As my teeth dig into the sandwich, my hair will tug from my upper lip. This is quite painful. But like how I treat life, I pride myself on endurance, longevity, loyalty and dedication, and of course stupidty.
I started growing the beard in November, and I hope to continue through to April. Some people declare March as Mustache month, so perhaps I will shave down to just the stache then. Though, maybe I will still be loving the poetic rocker look and continue to go Eddie Vedder on my face.
My beards in the past, have been multi-colored. They have been like the United Colours of Bennetton. They have been mixtures of brown, black, blonde and oddly, red. However this time there have been some strands of grey. You can’t really see them in the pictures that I put here, cause there are only a few. What you think you may see in the pictures is just odd lighting. But yes, my beard now even has some grey. I am older, wiser and more mysterious.
And yes, I just did a long obnoxious post about my facial hair.