Thirty Days of Mo(u)rning

Well, the cheeks are feeling the warmth of the sun for the first time in about six and a half years… and the chin has been freed from the fuzz for the first time in even longer! The Beard is no longer… because I cut it! And let me tell you, you can attach A LOT!… to a beard.

Throughout my life with Kateri, I would talk about how I really, really, really wanted to have one of those long… sorta unkept and scraggly… beards that you see on the faces of Old Timers sitting on the front porches of their hundred-year-old Vermont farmhouses. Ever since I could grow it, I’ve always had facial hair. When I was younger, I would change it up quite frequently. Then I kinda settled into the goatee and the occasional Fu Manchu with a western flare… and maybe some sideburns. I always enjoyed the Half Beard, but it made me look like Beaker if it got too long. From time to time, I would let the cheeks grow in, but there always came the point where it got a little itchy and since I work in kitchens… it got hot…! Mmmmm, hot AND itchy! So, for most of my life I’ve had something on my face… just not all over it.

This post isn’t about all the fun things those of us with Functional Facial Hair can do with it, this is about how I used a beard to help me take steps into a world I was unfamiliar with and scared of as I coped with the death of my wife. In some regards, I hid behind the mask of my own face… which I did not recognize.

Unconsciously, I quit shaving partly through Kateri’s Dance with Cancer. It just wasn’t a priority and since I already had facial hair, I didn’t really think of it. For the first few weeks after she died, for some reason I couldn’t really look in the mirror. I was in this kinda haze of just going through the motions while trying to keep my head on straight. I mean, I would while brushing my teeth n shit just to kinda check in, but only little glimpses. One night after getting out of the shower, I was standing in front of the steamed-up mirror and as I wiped the water away and saw the foggy reflection, I didn’t recognize the hairy person staring back at me. It didn’t look like me. I didn’t look like myself. And I didn’t FEEL like myself… or at least who I had been for the last two decades. It was an odd feeling that reminded me that life was different now and as I look back on it… that we can have profound moments pop up in our lives at the most unsuspecting times.

Widower Notes n Thoughts… on Beards:

• First and foremost, I… loved… my… beard…! I loved it the most at its longest. And it will forever warm my heart that I have the memory of being told that I looked like an Axeless Mountain Dwarf…!
• I had the beard for six and a quarter years… that’s how long Kateri has been gone. That sounds like a long time… and can feel like a week.
  • Kateri never got to see me with a long ass beard… she would’ve loved running her fingers through it. (I can feel that… and now I’m crying. Six and a quarter years that can feel like a week… and sometimes yesterday.)
    • I can also remember the feeling of Amanda (my girlfriend) running her fingers through my long ass beard… and it reminds me that there are new experiences out there simply waiting for us to get to them. Experiences that are exciting, fun, and feel… GOOD!
• There are people in my life that have never seen me without a beard… who weren’t a part of my prior Life.
• I’d like a job where I don’t have to put on a beard net, but I’d rather wear a beard net than find another job…!
• I don’t know the last time I had more hair on my head than on my face…! Of course, I’m currently in the experiment of “Let’s see what happens if I don’t cut my hair…?”. I’ve had a shaved head for quite a spell now. Once I started to… you know… get a “little” thin up there I decided to accept that I would probably be shaving my head for the rest of my life… or until I retire… or I get out of kitchens… or win the lottery.
  • I’m pretty sure the hair on the head will be gone in a few weeks.
• It’s fun seeing people’s reaction when you shave a beard off, but because I’ve had a beard for a while now… that’s how I picture myself in my brain. So, I found myself in a couple of situations where someone would be looking at me with this strange/quizzical look and I was trying to figure out why! Is there something on my face?!… in my teeth?!… are there flying monkeys behind me?! Nope… the person is just seeing my chin for the first time.
• Pandemic Facemask Beard was always fun to see at the end of the day. Wearing a facemask with a long-ass beard… not so much. The beard pushes the top of the mask into your eyeballs every time you look down! The blue surgical ones were the worst.

• Complete strangers will come up to you in the airport and comment on your beard.
• Last week, after six plus years, I wanted a change. I was ready for a change. Shaving allowed me to have a little fun while pushing my comfort levels on certain things… such as, how I look and/or people see me…!
  • Ok, my cheek skin definitely looked and felt like it hadn’t seen the sun in over six years! It had that kinda zombie flesh feel and appearance to it. I mean, that is if zombie flesh is as soft and smooth as John Legend singing Moon River on Barry White’s butt!… when he was a baby… and somehow had the superhuman strength to support being sat on by John Legend.
• I felt different with the beard… like a different person. When I looked in the mirror that evening a little over six years ago, I felt I looked like a person humbled by the weathering effects of Life… and in some weird way I wanted my actions to reflect it. By her simply being her, Kateri taught me so much about how to be a good person in this crazy world, but it was the loss of her when I truly realized I could’ve done or been… better. A better husband. A better friend. A better co-worker, acquaintance, and customer. I could’ve listened better. I could’ve made better choices. I could’ve been a better person. It’s not that I feel as though I’m some sort of horrible person that just went around punching puppies or anything… I just could’ve learned some lessons a little quicker. In some ways, the beard gave me the strength of a safety blanket to sorta hide behind as I tried to be the person I thought “that person” in the mirror looked like…! The Beard allowed me to change how people saw me… how I looked… how I felt… and with that, I thought I could start to figure out who I was in this “New Chapter”… and who I wanted to be.

P.S… I’m already working really hard on growing The Beard back!… by not shaving.