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As I lay in bed a few days ago, unable to sleep after a seemingly interminable spate of meetings at work, my mind wandering to all sorts of things including my beard, I started thinking about how my life has changed by wearing a big beard. By ‘big beard’ I mean a beard that’s 12 inches (30 cm) and longer, a point I reached roughly in June of 2015. That’s the length at which I realized I was consciously making decisions and developing habits to deal having a huge mass of hair hanging off my face. What I’m talking about here are the more mundane aspects of daily life. Thankfully the mental shenanigans of watching my face change so dramatically late in life are now behind me, at least I hope they are. That guy I see in the mirror every morning is the Tom I’ve come to know and that grey mass that frames his face is just as much a part of him as the receding hairline and puffy eyes (from lack of sleep, perhaps?).
As I lay there I thought it might be fun to chronicle the pros, the cons, and the indifferences of wearing a big beard. So, starting with this installment, I’ll post occasionally on some aspect of life with a big beard as I experience it, and what better way to kick it off than with the topic that started this post – sleeping - often the most frustrating or difficult or annoying thing about a big beard for me. So, here goes.
Sleeping, or lack of it, with a big beard:
Pro: Yes, pro, singular. There is only one thing about having a big beard that I actually enjoy when sleeping. I know this is going to sound odd but I get a curious sense of comfort and well-being feeling this huge mass around my neck as I lay in bed. Perhaps it’s how a child feels as he cuddles a stuffed animal or his favorite blanket. I guess it shows I’m just a big baby after all.
Indifference: Again, just one, the beard as air-filter or face mask. This actually took a lot of getting used to for me. I sleep on my stomach most of the time, so as my beard grew it started covering my mouth and nose, something that, at first, made me feel a bit claustrophobic on those occasions where I’d wake up in the middle of the night. Now it’s no big deal. I just lay there all night breathing through my beard and if I wake up with my face buried in a wad of hair it no longer bothers me and I can go right back to sleep rather than dealing with a panic attack.
Cons: Plural, lots of them.
1. 1) Rolling over involves calisthenics. Since I sleep on my stomach and my beard now goes well below my sternum I have to do almost a full push-up just to move my head, something that requires coming to near-full consciousness to execute. It’s not fun. I know you’re thinking “Tom, why not tie up your beard?” and I’ll get to that in the next bullet. I suppose there’s some consolation in knowing that I’m getting some additional exercise but I’m not sure the trade-off in the time it takes to go back to sleep is worth it.
2. 2) Getting ready for bed isn’t bliss. I’ve tried braiding, tying-up, and just letting my beard hang naturally and all have their downsides. Braids do a good job of keeping the beard somewhat contained but that come as the expense of comfort. Try sleeping with thick rope (noose?) around your neck and down your chest and you’ll see what I mean. It ain’t pleasant but I do it sometimes anyway, apparently to remind myself just how much I dislike it. Ties are worse. They tend to tug on the sheets and pull out hairs, so I quickly swore off those. Just letting it flow is the most comfortable but comes at the expense of mobility (see bullets 1 and 3). So, to avoid the angst of trying to decide among the lesser of three evils I just go to bed wearing my beard however it is I wore it during the day, which is usually with a small braid (about 4 inches) at the bottom. This works pretty well but leads to a particularly egregious case of bed beard but, being the inveterate procrastinator that I am, I don’t have to deal with that until morning, unless bullet 4 happens.
3. 3) Lack of mobility is a real issue. There’s more here than just the rolling over problem that I mentioned in bullet 1. My beard always seems to get pinned by some body part – chest, forearm, elbow, armpit, fist. It’s usually not a big deal, except for the chest as mentioned previously, but it is annoying. What is a big deal, a REALLY big deal, is the occasional conversation that ensues when one of my wife’s body parts is the offender. Well, come to think of it, a yelp of pain hardly constitutes a conversation but her commentary upon being awakened by the yelp does, as she makes sure that, while freeing me, I fully understand that she’s none too pleased with being awakened from what was, unfailingly, a particularly nice dream.
4. 4) Naps are pretty much a thing of the past. I work from home a lot and one of the joys of that used to be the occasional post-prandial snooze. Not any more. I usually workout in the late morning and shower just before having lunch, which means my beard is at its fullest just about the time that precious nap sets in, so laying down results in a rather offensive case of bed-beard, so bad that I typically have to rewet my beard to fix it if I’m planning to go out. I’ve tried many times just laying on my back – I’m just dozing, after all - but I invariably wake up in my usual position with my face planted firmly in the pillow and my beard now cast in some abstract, vagabond-esque design.
So, there you have it, my life trying to get some rest while wearing a big beard. If you’ve made it this far I hope I haven’t put you off growing a big beard! While these annoyances are real they fall far short of countering the pleasure that wearing this beard brings. I just figured I’d start with the worst so that the story improves in future chapters.
Now, with that, I need a nap.
Cheers!
Tom
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That’s a hilarious image, Yank! Now, we could complete the undersea menagerie if we could get Triibeard’s dyslexic albino sea lion in on it too I think you’re a lot closer to the ZZ Top imagine than you may think, too. All you need are the dark shades :smoking Thanks for the idea of the beard sling, too. That may be just what I need!
Thank you, birdbeard! I do enjoy wearing that big, lose braid and I’m glad so many people like the look. If you start letting yours grow out instead of cutting it you can wear it that way too for your 50th birthday. It’s a great place to store all those double-point needles
Thanks, bb! It actually doesn’t take much patience – I am not a very patient person, I’m afraid – it just takes a few adjustments, all of them worth it, IMHO. See below for another upcoming adjustment
TradMark, you can start braiding pretty soon, I think, perhaps even now (at least a small one). If you look back a couple of years in my journey to June of 2014 you’ll see that I started braiding it then, and I was at about your length, I think! Thank you for those kind words, sir!
Thanks, jraider!
A big beard definitely isn’t for everyone, Don, and if I can do my part to help guys live the big bearded life vicariously I’m all for it. It’s purely for altruistic reasons, of course, with no person pleasure involved Thanks for the birthday wish! That was a gin martini, wasn’t it?
Oh, man, Trick, the thought of a hammock and get my beard caught in the ropes makes my face hurt Then again maybe I could just dangle it through one of the gaps. Thank you for the compliment and the birthday wishes my fellow 1966er. It was a very good year indeed! Now, get yourself a new job and get growing again so I can see your big beard masterpiece!
Oh, they aren’t as scary as I make them out to be, Dave, at least most of them aren’t (see below for clarification). As I said, it all worth it!
Thank you, Sergey! Now you've answered Karl's and Dave's question
Now, it’s been an eventful week.
First, as I mentioned before, I spent the last weekend of my 40s at a friend’s house doing, among other thing, loads of cooking. He has the same high-intensity professional gas range that I do so we have a blast cooking together. With a high-speed range its live, open, intense flame comes the risk of catching things on fire and I’ve been worried that someday it would happen to my beard and, well, yep, it happened last Sunday. As I leaned over the stove to crab something I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye. I was scared to look down for a few seconds but then the unmistakable stench of burning hair wafted up and I looked down to see that several of the longest hairs in my beard had gotten singed. Fortunately it wasn’t much and I don’t think I lost an overall length, but I learned my lesson. I’ll start tucking the beard inside the apron even if it’s braided, as it was then. That was a close call!
The other big event was, or more correctly is, as Sergey just let on, my 50th birthday, which is today. It’s been a wonderful week of celebrating with close friends and family. It's been a great ride so far, so here’s to another half-century!
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