I stopped shaving sometime back in October in preparation for Grow-vember. Grow-vember came and went and I kept on not shaving. I’d thought about it, but then I remembered last year when the day after I shaved, we got the coldest weeks we’d had all winter. I’m not going to fall for that again. When spring arrives is when I’ll go back to my traditional appearance. My beard has become quite full over the months, so much so that my wife has informed me that I’m starting to look like the 19th United States President Rutherford B. Hayes and that it turns her on. Had I known that my wife was into well dressed bearded old men, I’d have perhaps updated my wardrobe and spoken more gruffly. As it stands, I have some work to do.

Bringing sexy back.

Rutherford was one of only five Presidents to have a beard and one of only twelve to have facial hair of any sort. The last president to sport facial hair was William Howard Taft from 1909 to 1913, who had a moustache. It’s been over one hundred years since we’ve had a president with hair on their face which I’m sure has been of great detriment to our great country. Oh, sure, the founding fathers were clean shaven, but look at the time and what was taking place. A good shave was probably one of the few great luxuries they could enjoy, and yes, shaving can be luxurious if done proper. Between war, disease, back breaking labor, FOUNDING AN ENTIRE COUNTRY, and a myriad of other problems, the shaving ritual probably felt like one the few moments of pure bliss and delight. If you’ve never had a proper shave with a hot towel and a straight razor, you’ve never shaved a day in your life.

Exactly what it feels like after a proper shave.

The last candidate to run for president with any kind of facial hair whatsoever (until now) was Thomas E. Dewey in 1948. Some have gone so far as to credit his moustache with the reason for losing. Both times. Now I’m not saying there’s any correlation here, but I find it mighty suspicious that the last time we see facial hair in the highest seat in the country is just before women got the right to vote. Now we’ve had a hundred plus year absence of the stuff. Then again, maybe it just goes with the fashion of the times. The longest streak of presidents with facial hair was 6 over a period of twenty years. That’s half of them in a twenty year span in the roughly two hundred and forty years we’ve been a nation. Still, until recently, there’s never been a century long gap in facial hair either. Perhaps todays ladies find facial hair threatening. Now that I think about it, perhaps this is the real reason Ben Carson won’t win.

“Oh, god! What the hell is that on his face!?”

Let that be a lesson to the next Libertarian who want’s a shot at winning the presidency. Find a way to get the Republican and Democrat nominees to both have facial hair, then come out with a smooth face. There’s no way he could lose.

“The beard, being a half-mask, should be forbidden by the police – It is, moreover, as a sexual symbol in the middle of the face, obscene: that is why it pleases women.” -Arthur Schopenhauer