No, no, no! It’s not a personal failing AT ALL. It’s the fucking patriarchy’s fault. Patriarchy compels women against their will to perform behaviors that are of no benefit to them except insofar as they provide some small respite from community ostracism. There’s nothing failure-esque about wanting to live a life free of ridicule.

I’ve never grown it to its full extent, so I’m not sure how fluffy it could really be, but I have an extremely dense profusion of extremely dark, heavy beard hairs. Plucking is not an option (I could spend half an hour a day and not be done), and my life as a good citizen would be basically forfeit if I let it grow, so I shave it M-F and usually let it grow on weekends and holidays.

I don’t really like the counter-argument (to shaving) that goes “but women are so beautiful in their natural form!” It still gives priority to beauty, it’s just that we’re now going to redefine it to include beards and hairy legs. Eh.

During some of high school I did not shave my (very hairy, not at all of the “you can barely see it” or “bleaches in the sun” variety) legs, and I enjoyed it. I hate shaving. But I’m too wimpy to feel like quite that much of a freak in public (I know this is a personal failing), so I do shave, at least in the summer, and occasionally during the rest of the year. I wish it weren’t so.

I don’t wear make up or fashionable clothes or uncomfortable shoes or do anything to my hair beyond washing and brushing it (no drying or curling, etc.), but I don’t know if that’s so much a brave stance against the patriarchy or just, you know, basic laziness and wanting to have a comfortable and easy life.

Aside from these little moral dilemmas (generally resolved, conveniently, in the direction of what makes me most comfortable), I have quite a nice life.

I may actually write about this later. Lots of body image discussions lately.

when we lived in santa cruz, ca i met two women with visible facial hair. one was an instructor at ucsc, where i once had a lowly job surveying empty seats in classrooms in use. i had to enter the room, announce myself as doing a survey for the registrar’s office, count, and leave. already shy and being extemely self conscious of everyone staring at me, i exited a class one day hyperventilating as usual and thought “did i just see a woman with a mustache?” the next time i went there i was a bit better prepared and indeed the instructor did have a decent mustache. ok by me.

i met the other woman in my later gig as a property manager. she was younger, a student, and had a wispy mustache and goatee. we would nod and smile when encountering each other in town, sometimes exchanging pleasantries. i didn’t tell her that i admired her naturalness, thinking it better to just relate to her as another human. i think she knew that.

When youger I felt a monster because of my small hint of a moustache. Nobody else seemed to have such, so I thought myself a horrid exception. Gradually I learned of other women with same “affliction”, and even saw a documentary which stated that more than 20% of women have facial hair. WHY AREN’T THESE THINGS TOLD TO YOUNG GIRLS? Instead they live their early years of womanhood believing they would belong to a freak show.

On the other hand, I can’t decide whether to shave my legs or not. I don’t in the winter, when I never wear skirts or shorts. Most summers, I expect the hair to bleach to unnoticeability, but as I age, I find this not to happen. Don’t know why. So this summer I’m shaving, except when I forget and then I have stubble, which I think is less attractive than either shaved or full hairy. Pathetic, yes?