Tales of Beards and Bracelets

In between the time that my divorce papers were filed and I moved into my own house, I went through a period of doing some things outside of my normal routine.  Namely, I grew a beard and bought a bracelet…well, I prefer to call it a wrist band but I’ll get to that in a moment.  These were somewhat subtle changes but they were things that I would not have done had I remained a married man. 

About a month before I moved out, I went on a business trip to Prague in the Czech Republic.  To get there, I had to take an international flight.  I looked into renting a car but the ones that go into the water were apparently all booked up.  Since this was an international flight, you had the opportunity to do some duty free shopping on the plane and as I was thumbing through the catalog, a man’s bracelet caught my eye…and again, I don’t like using the term “bracelet.”  It sounds too feminine for me.  Even though that is how they are classified I decided the term “man-bracelet” took that girly edge off. 

Anyway, this man-bracelet was made of Italian braided leather and had a titanium clasp.  Clasp.  There’s another term I’m not real fond of because, again, there is a feminine quality to it.  Clasps are for bras and necklaces and other types of jewelry and yes, this man-bracelet is under the jewelry umbrella but just on the outer edge and probably gets wet a lot.

Wow, I cannot stay on topic here, can I? 

So the man-bracelet caught my eye for two reasons: one, it was cool looking and two, I think subconsciously I was looking for a replacement to my wedding ring.  As I wrote in The Discord of the Ring, I loved wearing my wedding ring not only for what it represented but because it was comforting to have it on and to know it was there.  Once I stopped wearing it, I would occasionally panic because I thought I took it off and left it somewhere.  I still have those moments.  I needed something to take its place and this duty free bracelet for men felt right.  This was also the start of a pretty cool trip to a foreign country and I thought I was kind of kicking off my single life (I’ll talk about that in another post, though).  The man-bracelet was my new wedding ring; a symbol of me being single again.  Being round, it had the same quality as a ring but it wasn’t a ring so no connotations of being married were attached to it.  In a word, it was perfect.  I flagged down the flight attendant and bought that baby on the spot.  It didn’t last more than a few minutes in the box before it was on my wrist.  I still have it on and am considering maybe adding one or two others.  Is that too much?  Is one too many?  I’m not sure but I don’t really care.  I like it and that’s really all that matters although I did ponder if I needed to wear it on a certain wrist to indicate that I was not gay.  No disrespect to my homosexual friends and readers out there, but I grew up in a time where if you had an earring you’d better put it in the correct ear.  I thought maybe the same applied to bracelets on wrists.  Then I realized I was 47 years old, not in high school anymore and it was 2012 so I put it on the left wrist.

….that’s the correct one, isn’t it?  No…wait…don’t answer that.  It isn’t important.

The Man Bracelet!

After I returned from Prague, I decided not to shave.  Initially, it was the result of the laziness that is born out of depression but then it became something of a statement.  I was stuck in my old house with the MMC and the tension was still palatable.  By growing the beard, I felt like I was putting some insulation between myself and the situation.  Perhaps it was a mask of sorts, trying to hide my pain.  Truth of the matter, the MMC hated beards and that was pretty much the only reason I needed at the time. 

I ended up referring to the hair growing out of my face as my divorce beard.  Thus I had the divorce beard and the man bracelet.  Kind of sounds like a cheesy 70’s buddy cop show, doesn’t it? 

Divorce Beard and Man-Bracelet!  Two cops looking for justice…in all the wrong places. 

Thursdays at 8 pm, 7 Central!

I have never been one to grow a beard.  I had a porn-star style moustache for most of the nineties and I actually shaved that around the time that the MMC and I first met.  Interesting that I started to grow facial hair again when that the MMC were splitting up.  But beards?  I could never get one to grow fully.  It mainly grew thick in some places and thin (or not at all) in others.  Add to the fact that now that I’m older, the sides come in mostly gray so it didn’t look like it was growing at all. 

Still, I persisted with the beard for a good two months or so.  Unfortunately, I got a bad haircut due to a miscommunication between myself and my hair stylist (is that what they call the folks who man the scissors at Pro-Cuts?).  My almost shaved head looked really funny with my gray and splotchy beard.  I looked like the lead character on Breaking Bad and that really wasn’t the look I was going for being newly single and all.  I tried trimming the beard down so it didn’t look thicker than my hair but then I looked like I just got out of prison. 

Ultimately, I gave up.  I shaved off the beard and actually felt better about it.  I’m sure I will try to grow it again but for now, I’m back to being clean shaven and looking a lot less like a ex-convict, meth dealer or homeless programmer. 

I still have the man-bracelet though!  I won’t give up on that.

…I just may put in on the right wrist? 

Next time:  On the road again