Shaving (I'm A Man, Dammit)

Don't challenge me on this..

It's not gay. Not at all. Okay. Moving on. I've spent many years concerned about my facial hair. My first fear is that people think I'm idolizing George Michael. That is not the case. George Michael adopted his "beard look" in 1986. I didn't start wearing mine until 1989, when Prince did it. So I am not trying to be like George Michael, I'm trying to be like Prince, and that is not gay. No, it isn't. Shut up.

So why am I sitting here looking into my bathroom mirror feeling that my beard may not come across as manly as intended? I begin to question my own reasoning even as I stare at my three-day unshaven face, pre-sculpting. Was it really to look better, or just to cover the fact that fact that I have no discernable jaw line when there isn't a thin line of stubble to trace it? Or was it there to cover the fact that my skin is more sensitive than I am? That if my skin could cry, it would do so liberally and without shame every time a commercial for anything with old people in it appeared on the TV? At some point in my life, I learned that RuPaul also has to go a few days between shaving to avoid breakouts. This did nothing to strengthen my masculine feelings toward my beard.

I even hesitate to call it a beard. A beard is what Santa Claus has, it's what ZZ Top has, it's what Oxford professors and homeless men have. A beard is a long flowing drape of achievement, a testament to months of putting up with remarkably uncomfortable itching and random bits of food. What I have could be spray painted on and removed with a moist sponge. It's an embarrassment to the facial hair community that was officially outlawed in twelve states after Miami Vice went off the air. I have nothing to be proud of with this poor excuse for a beard, but it keeps the lower half of my face from looking like a butt, so it ain't goin' nowhere.

Regardless, it's time to turn the "I don't take care of myself" look into an "I care a little too much about how I look" look. My one glancing blow at metrosexuality. Not gay. Even though the term "glancing blow" seems to put some awful images in my head. No time to worry about that now, it's shaving day. The iPod is playing, the mood is set, the water from the tap is scalding, the mirror has been sufficiently steamed. There's no turning back now.

You'd think I would have remembered to buy some shaving cream.

There's no feeling quite like the one you get when you pick up your last can of something you need, and you already know there's nothing left inside. Sure enough, I press down on the top of the can, and rather than the thick, powerful pillow of rich foam, I am met instead with a pathetic drizzle of whatever happens to a chemical when it has no other chemical to react with. I thin line of white shaving sludge. After a minute of trying to collect enough to even attempt a shave, I apply what I have to my face and it immediately disappears, as if to tell me it's already given up, and so should I. Great. So now I'm left with two options: Shave dry, which will essentially set my face on fire, or use some other facial lube. Suddenly, my brain has to get involved. What is shaving cream anyway? It's just foam, right? I could recreate that with a bar of soap or some shampoo, right? RIGHT?

Then I see it.

How could I forget that I'm sharing a bathroom with a female person?

I notice a can of women's shaving cream on the shelf. Is this possible? Is THAT gay? It's bad enough that my iPod has shuffled to an Elton John track as I consider my surrender to the feminine product. I look at the can as if had just said something anti-Semitic to me, which wasn't terribly upsetting on a personal level since I'm not Jewish. Would it be so bad to put this stuff on my face? It's designed for legs and underarms, but I was about to use a bar of soap. How bad could this be in comparison?

Then I notice the details on the can.

Raspberry.

Her shaving cream has a FLAVOR? Is my face going to smell like a stroll through a dew-glistening meadow on a spring morning if I use this? I look at the can and it seems unusually heavy, perhaps it was psychological, or maybe it was because my own can was nearly as empty and exhausted as this story has already become.

No.

I will not be putting raspberry flavored woman foam on my manly face. It's tough enough being rugged as it is. I will work up a soapy lather like a man, and shave my face accordingly. I'll deal with the consequences later, perhaps I will get a nice story out of it. That's it. Let's shave.

Of course, the thinness of the line of stubble from my hairline to my jaw is directly proportionate to whatever song is playing when the shaving begins. Thank goodness Elton has gone away as I prepare my first blade stroke, only to be replaced by Erasure. I'm not gay, but I have to admit, my taste in music begs to differ. Even though Prince, Scritti Politti and the Thompson Twins are all decidedly straight, my affection for their music has yet to earn me any bar fight wins. Much like my taste in alcohol, they remain yet another sinkhole on my road to masculinity. Even "sinkhole" sounds gay when I say it. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against gay people, and I'd like to keep it that way. But while all my friends were learning how to fix cars and figuring out what running a post pattern meant, I was collecting Swatch watches and letting my female friends put makeup on me to try to get me to look like one of the guys from Duran Duran. Perhaps this is why I'm so sensitive, why I'm such a good listener. I never picked up that trait that makes you interested in watching a monster truck pull. But at least I'm enough of a man to shave without some girly product on my face.

Of course, I am going to have to exfoliate with an apricot scrub tomorrow if I don't want to break out.

As I stand there, overthinking the fact that I am overthinking all of these other facts, I glance at the razor I've selected as "my brand." Women fight a monumental battle each and every day trying to determine which of the thousands of skin care and cosmetic options thrown at them are the right ones for their particular style of face, and as a man, I don't think I'd be able to get out of bed each day knowing how many chances to fail awaited me around my own sink. For us men, most of whom can shave using a dull stone lubricated with shampoo or toothpaste or tile grout, there's really only one major decision to make; which razor is right for me? I stood there, staring down at the blue "if this gets any whiter, I'm taking half your face with me on the first swipe" strip just above the blade, and I notice that my razor has five blades. Five. Is this what we have become? In a world of "less-is-more" and cars that can stored in the overhead compartment, I am looking at five blades, and wondering how many times I need to slice at the hairs on my face before I make a difference.

Then my mind wanders to the marketing meeting where somebody had to explain the need for five blades. I can certainly understand the importance of one blade. That's a no-brainer, as a opposed to a no-blader, which would not only be an ineffective razor but also a lame joke that I need to remember to go back and remove after I'm done with this story. So one blade is obvious. Two blades, okay. The first one cuts off most of the hair, the second one does quality control and grabs the leftovers. Fine. Mind you, I'm not even 50% through the blade count, and I've already dismissed the rest of the staff. We're done here. But apparently my supersensitive skin and overanalyzing brain told me that more blades equals more awesome, so I had to spend the extra money to better slice at my own flesh.

My head goes back to that first boardroom discussion where five blades needed to be individually justified. Having no Internet access at my sink to find the real story, I was forced to dream up my own reasonable explanation for the boy-band-sized gang o' blades. And here it is:

The first blade startles and threatens the hair, letting it know that its days connected to a living thing are numbered, and soon it will be just another statistic.

The second blade quickly arrives and promptly apologizes for the first blade's boorish behavior, lulling the hair into a false sense of security.

The third blade sneaks up behind the unsuspecting hair and clubs it over the head, momentarily stunning it and leaving it open for attack.

The fourth blade cuts the hair effortlessly and without remorse.

The fifth blade arrives soon after to openly mock the hair for falling for the same trick yet again, it then joins the other four blades for a beer at a local strip club on the outskirts of town.

I'm pretty sure that's what's going on, but I'm no scientist. All I know for sure is that fourth blade really gives me a clean, close shave. I only wish the process didn't have to be so masculine.. I mean violent. Dammit.