Fungus face...

Having only recently succumbed to the fatal attraction of carefully trimmed facial hair I wonder now why I waited so long. Perhaps it was the fact that there was a time where my face had a little delineation without the need to emphasise parts of it with a topiary. But these days my face has become rather like a large lump of dough and without the addition of various clumps of beard, moustache and sideburn I look a little too much like a potato.

Of course it isn’t to everyone’s liking, but then what is? And it isn’t as if I’m doing any harm. I haven’t quite decided where my funny little beard is going, or if the sideburns should stay, but one thing is for sure - the moustache is staying at least for a while.

I’ve often dreamt of having an astounding moustache, the sort worn by strongmen and surrealist artists, but there’s always been something stopping me from doing it; actually a number of things. Firstly there was my wife. She doesn’t really approve of facial paraphernalia of the hairy kind. Secondly there was the convention of a corporate lifestyle where facial hair, at least in the UK, was rather frowned upon or at the very least thought of as a little too outré. And of course there was the time thing. It takes an inordinate amount of time to trim and wax one’s facial hair to perfection. Yes, I wax my moustache to a Poirotesqe curl and I’m hoping one day to have the full Dali.

At my age though, you have to go your own way and as I’m no longer under corporate bondage and have plenty of (too much) time on my hands, so facial hair seems to be the new thing. Besides, I was bought the most exquisite pair of moustache trimming scissors for Christmas. They are made to resemble a standing crane (bird not building equipment) and a tiny, ridiculously expensive tin of moustache wax. At some point I shall probably try making my own, but there is no finer feeling than waxing the ends of your moustache into pointy, peaky perfection.

Sometimes I wonder just what will my facial hair become? It could be a goat patch or a well trimmed goatee. It could be the full friendly muttonchops, or a handlebar, or a soulpatch, even a Van Dyke. Maybe I’ll go for the swashbuckling look, or maybe the Guy Fawkes thing. It’s so hard to decide when it just keeps on growing. Perhaps I can shape it into steam train.