Well, most of it, anyway. I can only very rarely bring myself to take off all of my facial hair, as it immediately leaves me with the condition I'd like to call "baby face," or, conversely, he-looks-like-he's-twelve syndrome. Only once every year or two will I make myself completely clean-shaven, down to the skin. Most of the rest of the time when I shave, I just take the guard off the trimmers and do a once-over, which leaves me with some good stubble. I like to think that it makes me look like a Miami Vice-era Don Johnson (who, coincidentally, grew up in Wichita).
Last night was a rare exception where I actually broke out the razor after the trimmers. I told my brother, Aaron, that I was going to try to get the Frank Zappa look with my facial hair. You know the look, I'm sure:
This, of course, proved quite difficult. My beard and mustache are thick, but they're not that thick. And, additionally, for any of you who have tried, it's quite hard to shave your chin into a square, especially if your chin hair isn't exactly conducive to that sort of fine-tuned shaping.
So, after trying to get it right and miserably failing, I shaved what was left of my face into a style that resembles, sort of, a capital T. This is the result:
I tapered it down, left it a little wider at the bottom, etc. Last night I wasn't a huge fan of it after it was done (a little something I'd like to call shaver's remorse) but today I think it looks good enough, I suppose. After all, there's not much I can do about it now. Coupled with my long hair that I still have for the moment, if I had a black mask you could call me Zorro. I also think it looks much better in person, as my camera is reeeeeeally old.
It's all part of The Reinvention of Brandon. When my clippers come in the mail from Amazon (they shipped this morning, and should arrive Monday), my hair will be sheared off as well. Gone is my original vow not to cut my hair until I finish grad school; while the long hair and thick beard both look good on me -- in my opinion, anyhow -- they're not exactly conducive to a) looking somewhat respectable and "normal," and b) helping me in the "not creeping out the ladies" department. There will be at least one or two days, however, if not all of next week, that you folks within the department will see me again with my long hair -- the specialized very long clipper comb I ordered won't arrive until next week sometime, which means I can't use the clippers until I have that as well.
Unless, y'know, you think bald is a good look on me. I can assure you, it is not.
This whole Reinvention of Brandon thing comes at a very opportune time, as well, and my reasons for it are myriad -- I'm now single. I've been single for about a month. I don't have a lot of money, I drive a car I bought for $500, and most of my "free time" this semester will be spent alone on the couch or in my Man Cave, reading various novels for my classes and/or writing papers on those novels. I've got to do something to get myself out there again, because this "solitary confinement" thing of living alone and never talking to anyone but the cats may feel liberating and peaceful at times, but it's also really fucking boring. I have to, eventually anyhow, get back into the dating scene, as scary and/or depressing as that may sound at my age, or otherwise I'll turn into the crazy cat man with the Decepticon car who never leaves the house.
I was invited out for drinks last night by a female friend, but didn't go -- I politely declined, as sweetly as possible. I was cooking dinner and running laundry at the time, and the Monte Carlo needs me to put gas in it before I can make another trip to Wichita and back. Besides, you know me and bar scenes -- if it were going to be just me and this friend, I would've tossed everything aside and leapt at the chance, but it wasn't. A fair amount of people from the department were going out together, and if you know me at all, drinking in a large group of friends always spells trouble. Especially when I'd have to drive home afterwards. I've always had a large aversion to crashing on someone's couch for the night unless I'm currently fucking that person, and believe me, I've not yet been that lucky in my new life of singledom.
A lot of friends, including my sister, have mentioned the word maintaining when it comes to dealing with life's problems and/or being single again after a long relationship. Up until recently I never gave the word maintaining much thought, as if anything my plan was to go onward and upward -- and it still is -- but maintaining is a good way to describe various parts of my life right now. After all, it's going to be hard enough trying to keep my head above water with all the work I have to do this semester, let alone trying to take care of the bills for the house, repairs on the car, groceries, sleep, etc.
The other thing I've noticed is the wide berth and the way it seems that some of my friends have sort of distanced themselves from me in the wake of the breakup. I don't know if I've been cast in some sort of unfavorable light since it all went down, or what-have-you, but the fact remains that some friends I had before the breakup are now either basically refusing to acknowledge my existence except when absolutely necessary, or otherwise seem to be in this mindset of "walking on eggshells" around me when talking to me, as if something they say is going to set me off, make me cry, who knows -- silly me, I thought people I called friends would know better than that at this point. Others, I've noticed, have even taken me off their friends list on Facebook, with no explanation. Which, to an extent, sort of makes me laugh just because it's so childish; it's not like any of those people have even talked to me since last spring -- they don't have the first clue about what's really going on with me, nor do they apparently care to know.
It may just be paranoia for the most part, and it may be that everyone's busy during these first few weeks of class, but really I don't know. I've been trying to maintain the friendships I have (and overall, I think I'm doing a decent job) and also trying to foster new ones with some of the new recruits. I've even started flirting with one or two lovely ladies, which is strange for me at this age. Luckily, they don't read my blog and have no clue it exists. Actually, of all my friends around the Wichita area, I'd be hard-pressed to say that even ten of them know this blog exists. My officemate does, and a few other guys in the department have been reading it occasionally over the summer (and now, into the fall), and maybe three or four of my female friends around the area/in the department know it's out there and have possibly glanced at it once or twice. It's not like I publicize it unless necessary, though one of those female friends jumped at the chance to read it on Thursday and told me she'd love to be able to see inside my head on a regular basis, so there's that. I don't even know if the former girlfriend still reads this blog, though it's not like that would make me filter anything I would say otherwise anyhow.
Still, even though I feel the need to get back into the "dating scene," at some point soon, I'll be doing it at my pace and my pace only -- there will be no rushing into things when it comes to this old man re-entering the field. With age comes wisdom in some regards, at least, though I know some of you would tell me that in my case, even that is debatable.
The rest of my day will be spent reading on the couch, as I've got a lot of work to cover this weekend. That's also where I plan to spend most of my time tomorrow, as well, as yes, there's that much to do. I posted a Facebook status update asking anyone who wanted to come up here and visit me in order to distract me to please do so, but have yet to receive any offers.
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