Beards

I recently had to collect some medicines from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital for my daughter, who had had an operation elsewhere and was thus unable to collect them herself but needed them fairly urgently.  My daughter told me the nurse would meet me by the main doors, so that I could just pull into the short wait there and avoid parking charges. In fact I had parked in a retail park a short distance away, done a bit of shopping, and then walked down to the hospital, and arriving there early enough to buy something to eat before collecting the medicines.

I made my way back towards the main door, and spotted the nurse straight away, holding the medicines in a small carrier bag. I was pleased, since my daughter's only guidance was that "she'll be wearing a blue dress" - not all that helpful in a hospital full of nurses wearing blue dresses. She also identified me, which she hadn't particularly expected to do, since my daughter's advice to her was that "he has a white beard." Or so the nurse told me.

I hadn't thought of myself as having a white beard, though happy to admit that my beard does contain some white hairs. On looking at myself this morning, though, I have to admit that there are not many hairs there that are not white. My daughter had worried that the nurse might be looking for something Santa Claus-ish, which my beard, being short and carefully trimmed, is not. I have nothing against the big bushy sort of beard, and often feel I'd like to have one. Several of my friends do, maybe not quite in the Santa mode, but certainly rougher and bushier than mine.

I use an electric shaver on those parts of my face I don't want to be covered in fungus, and a couple of weeks back it literally fell apart in my hand. I've had it for a while, and it's travelled to several continents with me, so I suppose it doesn't owe me much. I ordered a new one from Amazon, and meanwhile settled down to the idle pleasure of not having to shave even a part of my face every morning. I even began to persuade myself that I might not need a new shaver, and that I might begin to resemble the bushier of my friends.

Alas, the sort of beard that seems to look all right on them just looks like an old rug loosely attached to my face. And I find that I really hate my neck being hairy. And it began to itch something terrible, as folks round here might say. When the postman duly arrived, some days later than I'd hoped, bearing a parcel from Amazon, I was more than ready to open and use its contents. I wouldn't want to remove my beard altogether - after all, I've had it since I was just turned eighteen, and I flatter myself that it does quite suit me - but it's more than worth the effort to keep it neat.