Facial Hair

I was contemplating facial hair this weekend. I know kind of strange. My mind works in really odd ways sometimes, deal with it. I was thinking about how some people have a lot and some have next to nothing. I thought about teenage boys who get eager to grow a little on their face. Some succeed, others are a peach fuzz failure. Since going to college, each year Josh (our oldest) has participated in ‘No Shave November’. He has been quite proud that he is able to successfully grow facial hair. However, I have cringed each Thanksgiving when he comes home and I have to try to figure out how to touch-up the annual family Christmas card pic so that people don’t think he has developed hypertrichosis (the werewolf disease)! Seriously, I think he is pretty cute with his college student look (but don’t tell him–I enjoy repeatedly asking him when he is going to cut his curly red locks!)

This weekend I also contemplated FEMALE facial hair. Yes, the dark sad secret that women over 40 like to keep under wraps from the male population. I was standing in the grocery line and there was an older woman in line in front of me. The woman had a neck, that wasn’t really a neck, but instead was merely her chin stretched out to her chest...you know the look? Well below the bony protrusion of her chin, her ‘lower’ chin (aka neck) was COVERED in dark scraggly hair. I was horrified. I thought oh my how can you NOT see that in the mirror. Nope, she didn’t appear to be blind. She also appeared to be with her son...can’t HE see the crop of facial hair on her chin extension? Why doesn’t he tell her that she needs to do a little grooming and maintenance work in that area? I had a flashback to our wedding, 22 years ago. Our photographer (a nice woman) could have doubled for a billy goat she had so much hair on her chinny, chin, chin. I remember standing there during the picture-taking going, how? why? Why would a woman, a professional, be ok with having a goatee? Let’s just say that in our wedding party pictures, everyone is smiling.

My girlfriends and I have discussed this horrible sign of aging: the emergence of random facial hair. We have all made a pact to keep our tweezers readily available, together with a magnifying mirror. If one of us makes it to the rest home before the other, I vow to visit regularly and do a little maintenance for them! I know they will do the same for me.

Now, let’s not even get into a discussion of body hair....

I am me

My life is comprised of many things. I am a child of God first. I am also a wife and mother, daughter and sister, aunt and niece, cousin and friend, employee and co-worker. I am me. I am human. I have flaws. I fail, sometimes epically. I have strengths. My life is fluid–sometimes challenging, sometimes boring, sometimes exhausting, sometimes joyful, sometimes heartbreaking. While I often use the expression, ‘same shit different day’, I don’t think I really believe that. Certain elements are always the same, but the day to day always varies.

I LOVE to love others, to be part of their lives. To share their ups and downs, their joys and tears and fears. After growing up in a home where ugliness was hidden behind a perfect facade, for myself, I require brutally honest disclosure. If you want to know something about me, ask me. I have highs and sometimes very dark lows. I also have one of the strongest humor coping mechanisms ever developed!

I have difficulty putting myself and my needs ahead of someone else. I still think that is a good thing, but I’m learning that it isn’t a good thing when you have nothing left to give. I’m working on that. I sometimes trust my heart to the wrong person–someone told me to remember to ‘never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option’. While this can be taken as good self-preservation advice, I have a hard time subscribing to that idea. Aren’t most relationships always back and forth–one is strong, the other weak, or sometimes both are weak together or sometimes both are strong together? The black and white philosophy, the absolute ‘never’ is hard for me. Don’t relationships often operate in gray territory? I would hope that I would show grace to someone by making them my priority even when they are only able to make me their option. In turn, I would hope to always have people in my life that would recognize I was in need and forgive my flaws and failures and still love me in those times when I am not able to make them a priority but I still need them to make me their priority.

I’ve tried to teach my kids to always try to treat others how you would like to be treated, no matter how they are treating you. You will have fewer regrets in your life. It doesn’t mean you need to be a doormat. Sometimes, its hard to do, very hard to do. Sometimes you get slapped down. Then again, sometimes you end up discovering a wonderful relationship that you might have missed. Sometimes you teach someone something new about being a friend.

The beginning.

Over the years I have had friends tell me that I needed to write a book. More recently I have had people tell me, write a blog, please write a blog. So, I finally decided to do it. I sat down and I set up a blog. I hope those that asked me to start this aren’t disappointed.

Besides being encouraged to start this adventure, I decided to go ahead and take this step as a therapy of sorts for me. I often feel my day ends and I haven’t used all my words. I also feel a need for a creative outlet of some sort. I’m also doing it because my memory is beginning to fail me more than I like. Maybe early onset Alzheimers?? I can’t remember. I hope to be able to memorialize here the funny, the sad, the joyous, the disappointing, the hurt, the victory and the oftentimes completely unbelievable that occurs in my day to day life.

And so I begin...