Sorry, I Don’t Think I Will Try a Straight Razor
In this piece, writer Robert Isenberg gets up close and personal as he recounts his adventures in shaving. Isenberg is brave to dive right into each facial hair with none other than the age-old straight razor. Sure, the centuries-old razor has yielded many-a-time bloody results. But at the end of the day, adapting to the powerful tool has become a certain rite of passage:
I’ve unknowingly joined that bandwagon. I shave almost daily now, a level of discipline I never before mustered. Every chance I get, I sprint to the bathroom and unleash the blade. I pat Brut over my razor burn, a ritual I’ve never before practiced. I rarely cut myself anymore, although it can always happen.
All the best and commendations to Isenberg. But for me, a straight razor would just be too — well — sharp. It can be painful enough with a normal disposable razor with five mini blades. You have to hold it just right to avoid cutting skin, and scaling it over facial hairs that have seemed to spread deep roots brings special twangs of pain. Oh goodness the chagrin of having to walk around with large masses of toilet paper plugging small shave-cuts! And the dried blood can never seem to fully wash away.
Over decades, I’ve developed a long-standing battle with my facial hairs. For some guys, let’s be honest, facial hair just seems to naturally scale like wildflowers rising up freely in a prairie. Men can grow mouthstaches, goatees, and beards as easily as vegetables may sprout up beautiful and tall in a bountiful year’s garden. Their images populate the covers of magazines, grooming aisle products, and television ads. They are just as much the happening selfie images as shirtless bodybuilder poses.
For many others of us, the hair spreads sporadically from the baselines of our cheeks, upper mouths, and chins like weeds seeming to pop up from every corner of a vegetable plot. Time is never on our side. We can never get to the sink enough to shave. And even after we spend what seems like hours poring over every square inch of our face and hard-pressing several self-inflicted wounds, our friends, coworkers, or public passerbys are quick to tell us “boy you missed quite a few spots.” There is no such thing as a “bad hair day” for those of us inflcited with proliferating stubble and whiskers. It is more like days of chaotic scruff invasion that can live in infamy.
I’ve tried different remedies over the years. Electric razors did the trick for awhile, until the aging rotating gears would start to inflict heavy razor burn. And there is something disgruntling about the task of taking those crafty things apart to brush out all of the collected hairs. Luckily, I don’t need to take up straight-edge blades just yet. I have settled with the top-brand disposable razors that have the smooth tops on top. With enough shaving cream, these razors can do the trick and remove all amassing bits and clumbs of stubble. Even for me, shaving can become pleasurable. The fresh feeling after a full shave is one of those things no words can accurately describe.
