Week Twenty-Four: February 28th to March 6th

Maybe there are times your beard occludes your vision in such a way that you take horrible spills and ransack the skin on and around your hand. Or maybe you just shouldn't run at night....

There are sometimes harsh penalties to be paid by those who run at night, and my hand was the recipient of one of those penalties. In keeping with pop-law, this accident happened close to home, which was probably a good thing considering the blood loss. Just as with the infamous bike accident of a few years back, when an oncoming car turned quickly in front of me from a center turn lane and found me doing a tumble up and over their car, this accident also happened within sight of my home. Of course, in this accident no one yelled at me ("Boy, what the HELL are you thinking?") and no one was really around to witness it, as it occurred at about 10:30 on a weeknight.

Sometimes the sidewalk jumps up and bites you, what can I say? The hand is in recovery, though painfully scabbing over as I type. I still wear a glove to bed so I do not bleed all over our sheets and make my side look like a murder victim's chalk line. (It's already bad enough that my sweat so discolors the sheets on my side that we have to rotate and wash them a bit more frequently.) It is the rib on my right side that bothers me a bit more, and time will tell if landing on that hand and another chunk of sidewalk was enough to crack it, or just bruise it. Breathing is an issue, but the lack of bubbling, rattly fluid tells me there is at least no puncture, and I was back to running the next day, so it cannot be all that bad, right?

The beard is becoming evermore increasingly difficult to tame. Some of the mothers of students at our school asked me this week if it drove me nuts or, again, if my wife was tired of it. I told them the only tricky part was that grooming/combing this face-rag took longer than it did to push my hair into position day after day. As for my wife not enjoying it, well, her affinity for it is well-documented in past posts.

Next week? To the ruler! I fear the length is not all the same, and one must worry--or not--about uniform facial growth.

Week Twenty-Three: February 21st to 27th

And then comes the haircut. Despite what you may believe, and owing to my desire to sport serious jaw-mane, you would think I am equally comfortable growing hair all over my head. This could not be further from the truth.

As a lad, I was held captive by the whim of finances and my mother's desire to allow the hair of her sons to grow out to John-Paul-George-Ringo lengths, evolving into that hair-over-the-ears look I now so affectionately call my "Planet of the Apes" look. I did not like it at the time, but before I started pulling in the big bucks at Burger King, I was not calling the shots on my coif. Once I could, the hair came off at regular intervals, as I frequented a local barber who spoke in such fast southern-New-Hampshirean dialect that only those of careful auditory aptitude and ability to tune out the drone of the clippers in your ear could attend to his conversation. Thank you Tom!

Nowadays, though still handicapped by finances--hey, I am a teacher after all--I do get the more than occasional haircut. Usually I can make it from the Summer head shave until about Thanksgiving, and then again until almost February. The unruly neck hair, the thicket I have to wet comb, and, very nearly gel, forces me to scrape the funds together for a trim. This is when I pull a walk-in and the fine folks at Great Clips ask me, "You want me to use which clippers?" (A one on the sides and six on the top, if you are similarly-inclined.)

This time, however, was a wholly different experience, as most of my pre-cut instruction was in a series of pleas about the care to be taken around the fringes of the beard. "Now, be sure you leave the sideburns...when you reach the neck, please don't trim the jawline extensions...." Even still, the elderly woman who crafted such an otherwise fine 'do, caused my heart to leap a bit when she snipped off the sideburns on both sides, but left the right side a bit shorter than the left. I left it. Every beard journey needs the tracks of the adversity it endured along its path to amazing.

When she finished, I was all-too-please to look in the mirror and, nearly disregarding her question about how it looked, spy, for the first time, The Jullet. Whereas the Mullet is the hockey haircut known to be "business on the top and party in the back," The Jullet is business on top and party underneath! Enjoy.

Weeks Twenty-One and Twenty-Two: February 7th to 20th

Welcome to the hidden reality of bearding:

Larger and shaggier beards, though truly awe-inspiring and, perhaps, envy-producing, make people uneasy. At least most people feel even more free to say things they would never ordinarily say to people.

Phase One:
"So, you're really letting that thing grow out, huh?"

"Huh, that beard's getting pretty long."

"Wow, I haven't seen a beard worn like that before."

Phase Two:
"So, are you planning to shave that thing?"

"That's a pretty long beard. When are you gonna shave it?"


Phase Three:
"OK, so that beard--you must be getting pretty tired of it now, huh?"

"Wow, that is some beard, doesn't it drive you crazy?"

"That's what you are wearing on your face?"

"Um, yeah, I think it's time to shave. that thing!"

Yes, but you see, the thing is, when you spend this much time cultivating the facial moss-mat like this, you get to enjoy it as much as you might a good pair of socks or favorite shirt, and I can attest that it is at least as warm as the good socks, and not nearly as holey as that shirt. Plus, whereas things of mine, like wardrobe items, that would once qualify as "best," because of their particularly ratty, ragged, or holey attributes, seem to disappear in the loads of laundry that I don't get to before my wife. I have no fear that I will wake up freshly-shorn because she actually enjoys, promotes, and endorses this entire project. And this despite the most frequently-uttered comment/question: "So, you're wife must be getting pretty tired of that..." OR "Well, how does your wife like that?" OR "Sure, you like it, but what does your wife think of it?"

However long this beard lasts, and it will be at least until the end of this school year/beginning of the Summer, it won't disappear because of public peer pressure, nor because of my wife asking me to get rid of it. Count on it!

Week Twenty: January 30th to February 6th

OK, so I'll be the first to admit, I have a long way to go, or grow, as it were. On the bottom, if you have even noticed, is me, with the Snow and Ice Beard in honor of the winter weather we have had much of in the past week. (We had three snow days! The Summer will now commence that much later.)

On the top, which is probably so occupying your attention you may not even be reading this text, is the absolute beard eclipse currently under cultivation by my brother. To be fair (to me) he does have at least a month-and-a-half head start on me.

The plan for these Bro-Beards is to continue growing them at least until the first weekend in May. Why, you may ask? That is the weekend we two bearded brothers will find ourselves traipsing about the slopes of Mount Snow in Southern Vermont. Late-Spring snow? No, nothing of the sort. We will be one of the many semi-psychotic teams running in the Mudder, a challenge designed to test stamina and mental fortitude. (Check it out at toughmudder.com.)

How long will these beards be by then? It is difficult to say. The tangled jaw-mane already ensnares my shirt collars, ties, and jacket zippers throughout the day. My students perpetually test the depth during our read-alouds, sinking their fingers into my jawline and marveling that they disappear up to the second knuckle. "Whoa! I can hardly see my finger anymore!" I will resist the urge to inquire about recent hand hygiene and general cleanliness....

Weeks Eighteen and Nineteen: January 17th to 30th

I was pondering the queries of anyone who stumbles upon this site out there. Now that seemingly everything is connected in microseconds, there is no hiding anything launched into the web that is e-communication. Based on some recent news events, I am sure some folks would wish that not to be the case.

I could imagine someone finding this blog and wondering: "Why does this guy insist on taking close-ups of his face? It's not like he's a good-looking dude..." or "What's with this dude, does he want to be an actor or something?" Then, for the few who might actually read the accompanying text, one can only imagine speculations about me and what kinds of screws rattling loose in my upper region.

No matter: as the beard grows, so does its notoriety. People who have seen me nearly every day of its growth now feel free to comment on it, often with inquiries about how long I plan to keep this up. Though a mostly innocent question, I love the facial expressions with which they deliver it, and revel in the fact that most people make no attempt to control their looks of disgust. Even my students ask, "Um, when are you going to cut it again? It's too big!" Every once in a while one of them pokes a finger into my chin or jaw and then removes it to tell a friend, with shock, "Whoa--it's thick!" One Fifth Grader who hadn't seen me in a couple of weeks (they are in the opposite wing of our school) stopped dead in the middle of the hall yesterday and said, "Oh, NICE beard!" Why thank you; I agree.

Weeks Sixteen and Seventeen: January 3rd to 16th

Normally, I would not even consider naming a beard--that look of rugged manliness--anything close to something my own daughters, those local supporters of anything and everything princess, would say. But, this name did not come from my daughters. For some strange reason, this was the first time many people at school, and ion public, took notice of the beard for its length and proportions. Perhaps it may not have been all that strange after all, considering I finally decided to comb out the chin-locks and let the hairs fly in their non-pillow-pressed form.

What resulted was a tumult of comment and inquiry like so little that preceded it. One of my former students, now a Fifth Grader, should get the full credit for the name, as she came to visit one morning and talked to me for a few minutes before glancing at it and stopping mid-sentence to say, "Wait, what happened to your beard? Why's it so fluffy?" This was among the most popular question of the past two weeks. But a great many people praised the sheer magnitude of that hair which I had previously tucked under my jaw, saying things such as, "I like the new look," and, "It suits you," not to mention, "Yeah, my husband tried to grow one and it never fills in...it's too patchy." The things you learn about spouses, and people, through facial hair history or quite interesting.

Frankly, the hair reaching back, ivy-style, and clamping at my earlobe, and the hairs trailing down my neck to scratch near my jugular had been driving me a bit crazy for a little while. So, after the shower one evening, when I had a brief moment of let's-shave-this-sucker panic, I combed it out. Sure, some tears sprang to my eyes in that involuntary way, such as when you pluck a nose hair (not, of course, that any of you would know anything about that...) but the relief of the smooth, flowing facial locks was quite a sight to behold.

What adventures the beard will encounter in the coming weeks remains to be seen. Our school nurse got a glimpse of it this week and inquired, "Whoa, what's goin' on with that beard, Abe Lincoln?" Oh yeah, mission accomplished!

Weeks Fourteen and Fifteen: December 20th to January 2nd

Ah, those fortunate few students who were present right until the bell on the afternoon of December 22nd--the last full day before the extended Winter Break--they were the only ones to glimpse this epic in the making. For this photo, I combed-out the hair that had been tucked under my chin for weeks, surprising even myself. Those students, both of them, present to witness the spectacle were on the verge of lack of speech, which is saying something for a Second Grader who has only days of free time spreading out before him until the New Year.

I had to savor my glory while it lasted. My parents had been raving about my brother's face-mane for weeks, and in that way in which only hopeful mothers may rave: "Oh, I do hope you boys will shave before we do family photos at Christmas. Of course, she knows both of us well enough to be sure that saying something like that is the only sure way to have the near-twin manes appear in all Christmas photos.

Since I do not get to see my brother very often--he, like my parents, lives in New Hampshire--I had no idea what to expect. I hoped only to capture a photo of Brothers in Beards while we visited. Time will tell...