Beard Love

It gets hipper and hipper. I'm having a bit of a mid-life crisis with mine. I'm growing it some more, but at 46, there's a big white patch right down the front and some white side-burns at the side. Aaron thinks it's hot; and all the twinks seem to love it. But I'm just not ready for the Santa look quite yet. So I've been dabbing some Just For Men on the white bits - not totally, just dabs, to take the edge off - and, after consulting various online beardologists, I'm using a color much lighter than my natural hue.

Only my cattier acquaintances have noticed. And you know who you are.

My excuse is that I'm bald already so I get a pass on the greybeard thing in my 40s. Anderson has been white for almost as long as I've known him (ah, the Washington YMCA in the 1980s!), but he's so cute he can get away with anything. Brad Pitt's gray streak in what has to be admitted is a quite nasty little straggler is also offset by preternatural beauty.

So I guess this is a kind of pre-emptive confession to make myself feel better about it.