A Man With a Mustache, A Man Without A Mustache

It separates the men from the boys. It's a sign of wisdom and virility. It harkens back to a day when being a Macho Man wasn't necessarily a bad thing. I'm talking facial hair.

Being in my mid-20s, I've had a few years under my belt experimenting with the wild woolly world of pogonotrophy, the growing of male facial hair. In fact, for the better part of the last two years I've been sporting a trim mustache and beard combo in style commonly known as a Van Dyke. While this look was popular with the beatniks, communists and nineties grunge-rockers, it has failed to establish a niche for itself in the current popular consciousness of acceptable male style.

You'll be hard pressed these days to find a man under the age of 40 sporting this look un-ironically. No, these days it tends to fall under the category of Dad, Cop or Hippie. Like the old time hockey players who didn't have to wear a helmet, the older generation seemed to be grandfathered from these restrictions, free to express their masculinity without fear of repercussion. Being a man with a mustache in your twenties is to be a man facing an uphill battle; potential employers look at you through a lens of heightened scrutiny. Women are less likely to give you a second glance and the general populous may not take you as seriously as you like.

That's not to say that successful people can't have a mustache. Many trailblazing men proudly wore the marker of their gender on their faces. Ernest Hemmingway was famous for his bearded ways. When he wasn't painting, Salvador Dali was turning heads with his gravity defying pencil thin mustache. Posters of Einstein and his soup strainer can be found in college dorm rooms around the world. The iconic Che Guevara has inspired many an upstart socialist to sprout his own revolutionary beard.

It's said that the mythological Argonauts spun hairs from the beard of Zeus himself to make the rope used to tow the Trojan Horse. Some of the most successful and richest businessmen in the world have facial hair, like the third wealthiest man in the world, Mexican telecommunications tycoon, Carlos Slim Helu, who is worth an estimated 67.9 billion dollars.

There are entire websites dedicated to the praise of the mustache. Ratemymustache dot com offers four categories of mustache for people to enter images of their 'staches for the appraisal of others. I even entered one of my mustachioed pics to see what the Internet thinks about my crop.

When debating whether or not to give my furry friend the heave-ho by way of a four-bladed razor, I was polling random customers at a coffee shop I've been known to frequent. The majority of the guys urged me not to "cave to the man" and keep my winter coat.

The overwhelming opinion was that it was awesome to show the facial hair. Mind you, the most of the guys who gave me that gem of advice where also owners of a deforested visage. They were most likely hoping to live out their bearded dreams vicariously through me. Most of the women I asked told me that I should get rid of the Van Dyke.

One 20-something woman said this: "It's hard to pull off that look without looking like a dirt bag. I'd have to get to know you first to see if you could pull it off. But if I just saw you on the street, I'd think you’re a sloppy dude." Sobering words from a valuable source. After all, she comes from the target audience most guys try to impress with their looks.

But the most important opinion came from the one person who has to look at my face more than I do. My girlfriend. Although she said she'd support my decision either way, she did tell me that she'd miss my mustache and beard.

"It makes you look older," she said. "I feel more like I'm dating a man than a boy when you have a beard."

In the end it was pure superstition that won over my choice to go with the blade. Last year around this time I banished my barba y bigote, and good luck followed in folds. So now in an attempt to tap back into reserve of good vibes, I've shaved.

Now I'm bright-eyed and fresh-faced once again. My coworkers have said that it's a bit of an adjustment, but I look just as good, or even better, minus the sod.

I have noticed a difference in the way I'm treated. Women are treating me better. A little nicer here, an extra smile there. But the men are treating me worse. In the last three months of working at my current job, I've never had to deal with any sort of aggression or confrontation from male customers, but in the span of one shift since losing the hair I've had to defuse more than a couple of potentially volatile situations. It seems that by looking incrementally less masculine, some guys out there now see me as less of a peer and more of a target.

It's funny, though. I still reach for my mustache when I'm deep in thought or reading an article of interest. Before I would stroke my beard while I was pondering, but now I have nothing to aid my brainstorming. Like the phantom pains of an amputee, I'm experiencing a longing for my lost friend.

My girlfriend said I went from looking twenty-six to looking twenty-one in the span of 10 minutes. Maybe I’ll grow it back. But I haven’t decided to yet. For now, I'll wait and see how my lucky shave pans out.

(Photo at top by Steve Venegas vividly depicts the author's transformation.)