So, here’s me, dealing with yet
another horny dilemma.
To shave or not to shave, that is
the question.
That is to say, do I shave the
beard I have grown? Or do I endure the niggling snipping and snapping necessary
for a neat beard and occasioned by a wholly unwarrantable desire to appear
well-groomed?
In the one hand, a well trimmed,
mostly salt beard, although, I’m told, with enough of a serving of pepper to
make things interesting. Whatever that means (told, but not explained); a
presentable marker of my age, experience, and wisdom (putative).
In the other, a clean shaven mien
that, I’ve been told, belies my chronological age, which, according to
researched reports, is a good thing, bordering on an Official Good Thing.
In the third hand, the memory of
behavior of mine, behavior, I’m convinced, that has its origins in the mistaken
belief that youthful appearance allows for youthful licence. And that, that, makes me want to get away from my
skin, from the inside. Knowledge of actions and behaviors; knowing that I gave in to impulses
that read inelegant in anyone let alone in a man of my age and experiences,
well-travelled and adequately scarred experiences, makes that particular
handful somewhat slimy to the touch.
And therein the horny dilemma, the
beard, for all its flavourful connotations, is a daily, quite often startling,
reminder that I am not a young man. And that for all its charms wit, and/or
wisdom, cannot substitute for youth and prospects. But, a well-trimmed, not to
say manicured, face-lawn does, and has, facilitated exceedingly pleasant
interactions (of the cerebral kind) India’s talented, bright, enticingly
intelligent, single, – operative word heads-up – young, women. [Side bar – Bengaluru’s beer, bullshit,
and bonhomie, scene does not seem to include single women appropriate to my
age.] A clean shaven misapprehension of youth and presumed vigor, jeez, that feels so, y’know,
Trump-like.
Ah well, a long Sunday brunch, in
a convivial caravanserai, exploring ideas and emotions with a woman who smells
of spring evenings and whose laughter sounds like temple bells in the mist, can
last for hours. What are we looking at with the other? 7, 10 minutes, tops, and
that’s if I can remember my multiplication tables.
I guess this is why god made the
incognito windows.
