For the past several years, I have had a moustache and goatee, but it’s my habit to go clean-shaven every five years. I tell people that it’s to verify that I still have a chin and an upper lip. Eventually, I grow something back, usually in a different style.
This year, I went clean-shaven a little over a week ago, on my birthday, and even warned people in advance. The last time, I did it on a more-or-less sudden whim, which caused Marion to do a double-take when she saw me. She let me know that it was a shock to her.
This time, reactions have varied:
Marion, who had been warned, asked, “Even the moustache?”
A co-worker said that I look a lot younger.
My daughter, who didn’t get any warning, said, “You don’t look evil anymore. Now I can date again.” (I was preventing that? I guess I’ll have to grow ’em back.)
At DUO practice the other night, one person told me that if I had curly hair, I’d look like Mickey Dolenz (although his hair doesn’t look curly anymore). Another told me that I looked good, and I should never grow a beard or moustache again. She also said I looked like George Reeves (thus the title).
It’s not the first time I’ve been told I looked like someone famous. New Year’s Eve, someone told me I reminded him of Dennis Miller. At a Blogger Bash a few years ago, Zombyboy told me that my driver’s license photo made me look like Saddam Hussein. When I was working at NBI in the early eighties, I had a boss who thought I looked like Dan Ayckroyd. And back in the mid-seventies, I spent an afternoon running around Naples with the wife of the American consul. One of the stops we made was at the studio of sculptor, who grabbed me, positioned me near a wall, and backed away to talk to her. I could hear them chattering away in Italian, and could sort of see their gesturing out of the corner of my eye, but every time I’d move, I’d be repositioned in the desired pose.Eventually, I found that my profile had been compared to that of a bust he’d done of JFK.
I’m sure my profile has changed since then, but I’ve never taken that many photos of myself, particularly from the side, and it’s not something I can normally see in a mirror. The only commonalities I see in the men whose looks mine have been compared to is that they are all men, and they’re all much more widely known than I am. Personally, I think I’m looking more and more like my father – just with more hair than he had.
I’ll start regrowing the facial foliage in a couple of months (about the time Marion stops doing double-takes, probably). We’re going on a trip at Christmas, and my driver’s license and passport both show me with the moustache and goatee.
And I’ll say to my chin and upper lip, “See you in five years.”