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The
Beard PAGE
TWO: "Hey, nice beard," he said. "Thanks." "Yeah, it looks good. Looks good. Really good." A man of few words, my father often repeated them for emphasis. "I'm not sure how long I'll keep it," I said. "You should keep it. Definitely keep it. It looks good." "Well, we'll see." My words surprised me. Up until now, I had imagined keeping the beard forever, seeing as how it gave me an identity beyond such non-descript characteristics as brown hair, brown eyes, and a slightly below average height. I had hoped the beard would make me stand out from the crowd, but now I barely stood out from the only man standing next to me. My mother was right. Our beards looked nearly identical, the flecks of gray in his a preview of what mine might look like in twenty-five years. My father must have seen my beard as a sign of allegiance, something he must have craved in the wake of the divorce. He had been ostracized by most of our family's friends, their moral compasses pointing solidly toward the one partner who didn't have the affair. But swearing allegiance wasn't possible for me, clarity being a luxury only distance can provide. My father had taught me everything I knew about being a man and husband, but what did it mean now that he had made one of the worst mistakes a man and husband could make? Could I look like him but not be like him? As my father showed me up the stairs I felt the urge to pull all the hair from my face. Barely two steps beyond his front door, I instantly classified his apartment as less a home than a storehouse for a downsized life. A wooden chest that used to be in our formal living room now supported a television set and cable box, the horizontal surface of this makeshift entertainment center covered by a layer of dust that looked as if it had developed at the same rate as my beard. Pictures and framed art posters that once hung throughout my family's four-bedroom house now shared the limited wall space in his one-bedroom walkup. The entire living space was set up on an oriental rug that had once covered our dining room floor. It had survived dozens of dinners, Passover Seders, and Thanksgiving holidays without so much as a drop of wine spilled on it. Now it was covered with dog hair. My father and I were not practiced in the art of heart-to-heart conversations, as it had been my mother who had dutifully served as the emotional conduit between us. In the past, if my father picked up the phone on the occasions when I called home, it was an instant sign that my mother was out running errands. When he and I did talk, our conversations were about as substantive as the 11 o'clock news: all we ever covered was news, weather, and sports. That's why we sat, finding more room in the awkward pauses than in his cluttered apartment, unable to sustain much in the way of conversation. I couldn't talk about the past two days with Mom; he wasn't interested. I couldn't ask him about his love life; I wasn't interested. I tried to tell him about New Zealand, and opened his laptop to show him some pictures online. He offered an occasional comment on the scenery, but mostly seemed more interested in my beard's progress in each picture. "Looks like it was coming in good there," he said. I excused myself to the bathroom even though I didn't need to use it. It wasn't filthy, but there was a sailing magazine on the floor by the toilet, a ring around the tub, and a towel on the floor by the sink, hardly the markers of a man who regularly hosted friends at his apartment. I splashed some water on my face, and noticed tiny hairs scattered around the drain. An electric razor stood on the bathroom counter, its base plugged into an outlet next to a light switch. If I kept my beard, I'd have to get one, too. I came back out into the living room and told my father that I had to get moving. He put the dog on a leash and walked me to the car outside. Just as I was about to turn to open the car's door, my father pulled me close and hugged me, holding me as if he knew I was likely to be the last visitor he'd have for a while. "Keep the beard, keep the beard," he said. "Okay," I said. He told me he loved me and let me go. As I climbed into the driver's seat, the dog stood on her hind legs and pressed her nose against the car's window. She and I were about the same age, at least in dog years, and I noticed the grey patch that was coming in among the chocolate hair on her chin. Did everyone here have a beard?
My mother hated the beard because it made me look like my father. My father loved the beard for exactly the same reason. Would shaving it off mean conceding to my mother's fragile emotions? Would keeping it mean siding with my father, ignoring or even excusing his graceless exit from the marriage? Are there two forces any more opposing but equally powerful as one's parents? And what did it mean that I stroked my beard as I asked myself these questions on the drive home? Was it even possible for a beard to bestow wisdom and maturity? Maybe I had invested too much transformative power in my facial hair. I reminded myself that I had initially chosen to grow mine simply because I wanted to see if I could. The final word came from my wife. I returned home and immediately noticed that Leora's affection for my beard was suddenly replaced with an unease impossible to ignore, especially one morning when she pulled back as I tried to kiss her. "What's the matter?" I asked. "Your beard," she said. "It's starting to creep me out." "I thought you liked it," I said, wondering if she could sense my own insecurities about the beard. "Now that it's grown in," she said, "you remind me too much of my father." I had
to laugh. I had spent the weekend so torn between two competing
parents, that the idea of someone else having conflicting feelings
about a father or a mother seemed impossible. I pulled Leora close
and we stood together in the hallway of our apartment, quiet for
a moment, my beard pressed against her face. My parents' marriage
may have fallen apart, but mine was just beginning.
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He
held back Roxy, the chocolate lab who as a puppy had filled my parents'
empty nest, as she tugged at her leash. As I stepped out of the
car, my father's hand landed on my shoulder, pulling me close.
