August 21 -- Day 7 in the Return of the Beard saga, or, I'm not afraid of my age

It was a busy week -- I moved home from camp, had a few days of breathing time, and then back to school for in-services.  I had three days of a beard when I walked into the building -- basically just a hint of a beard.  A lot of people didn't recognize me, and there were a lot of second looks.  And a lot of questions.

Why did you do it?

Did you lose a bet?

Are you going to stay this way?

But, the comment that I heard often that made me realize that the beard needed to come back was you look so much younger!

Why would I want to look younger?  What is it with our society that makes people ashamed to look their age?  I'm 46, dammit, and I'm proud of each and every gray hair that I have in my beard.   So, yeah, I'm growing my beard back.

I headed back to camp on Friday since there is a bunch of stuff still happening there.  On Sunday, I helped set up for the Norwegian family week with Gorm, Magna, Odin, and Olava.  Olava is Magna's daughter, and she's a cute kid.  It was fun watching her the first time she saw me -- her eyes got extremely large, and I think she would rather have me with a beard as well.

It's been an interesting experiment, and at the end of week 1, it's still not long enough to measure.

 Olava and me (and me sporting my Gus Mcoy t-shirt

 Closer of me

Keeping my neck and high on my cheeks shaved for now