Beard, or no beard: that is the question

Jendy, who I’ve only known since 1987, asked:

If you were to shave your beard, would Lydia recognize you? Would I? ([Paul [her husband] says his kids would do a double take every spring when he used to shave his off!)

I don’t get to see Jendy as often, now that she has a new job. When she worked in a public setting, I’d see her once or twice a month. So she didn’t know that, in fact, I DID have my beard shaved off, on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. It had become a scruffy mess, and I needed to get it trimmed. But once in the chair of a new barbershop, I let the whimsy of the moment carry me off, and had all the facial hair, save for the mustache, removed. Lydia seemed to recognize me, and I’m sure you would too.

Know who didn’t recognize me? I didn’t. Back in 2004, and before, I had a medium-dark complexion. (That’s me on the left in a picture taken in April 1997 for Bill and Orchid Anderson’s wedding.) Then I got the vitiligo, which, not only created lighter patches on my arms, hands, legs and elsewhere but generally lightened the skin on my face. And because I am afraid of sunburn, or skin cancer, even with sunscreen, I tended to avoid direct sunlight whenever I could. This made my face considerably lighter, to a point that I did not even recognize myself in photos. There’s one in my church newsletter from three or four years ago, in which the only way I knew it was me was seeing the outfit I was wearing. This picture from May 2010’s Free Comic Book Day does not look like me to ME.

It’s not just that I think I look better darker, it’s that it’s how I see myself in my mind’s eye. It’s not like realizing I’m grayer or heavier; it’s something much more fundamental that I cannot describe except that it was my SELF-IDENTITY.

Then, either I stopped worrying as much or something, because I guess I spent less time hiding under umbrellas in the summers, and some of the color has returned to my face, as you kinda can see in the picture below, taken in early February 2013. When I got the shave in November, I could see this odd streak of skin where my beard had been, lighter than my skin color in the 2010 pic. It looked WEIRD, freakish. I almost took a selfie, except that I actually had no idea where my cellphone was. So now the beard has returned, and while I’ll trim it, I doubt I will cut it off any time, certainly not in the near future.

This ties in nicely with a question by New York Erratic:

What’s your favorite weather?

Partly sunny, or partly cloudy, with high clouds filtering the sun. Never liked the direct sun, even as a kid. The heat index, that combo of temperature and humidity, starts bothering me at about 90F.

Not crazy about the cold at the post when the condensation on my mustache freezes. Don’t mind the rain, though I’d rather be indoors. Some snow is fine. I’d find San Diego weather boring.

Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto. View all posts by Roger