Ah yes, my goatee. Let me explain my old friend: It has been with me for more than a decade now and has no intention of going away or retreating from the camp it has established, despite the many permutations it has undergone over the years. It has often put me in harm’s way, particularly with my mother who was not pleased when I decided to adopt what may have seemed to her a rough Rastafarian look (halfway towards dreadlocks which never arrived).
Another problem arrived with girls - at least with those who wanted a goodnight’s kiss - who complained of scratches and scrubbed lips. In this latter case, I do admit that I shaved off a few of the excess strands that may have scraped against their dainty mouths, but (like most of the relationships) it did not last and since then I have ignored all requests to remove my moustache’s alter ego. It needed the accompaniment; my urge to grow it out came from a desire to be different, to stand out; I did not want to resemble any of the other guys who stopped with the initial soup-strainers above the lips. It did not seem to owe anything to the fashion of the times (this was pre-grunge; pre-Cobain). It was something uniquely my own, with the added bonus of having the ability to annoy the ones who wanted to be annoyed.
Life was and is good with it, yet that clerk’s comment had me thinking about what it may have meant to others who were silent on my hirsuteness. Were there questions about my nationality that were never aired, or at least made public? Did I really look Middle-Eastern in certain eyes?
Do you look M-E? My children do.... ;)
ReplyDeleteYes, I do look like ME! ;)
ReplyDelete