I've never really been able to grow a good beard. It takes a LONG time to get anything, and it never gets nice and full, kind of thin and scraggly. About 17 years ago I was out of work for a couple months and decided to try again then. I still have it, although just as scraggly as always, but without it I'm a total baby-face so I keep it. It and the mustache are mostly gray now. I've thought about coloring it, even bought the Just For Men for Beards package but never used it. I figure it would be too much hassle to keep it colored as new gray stuff comes in, so screw it I'll just keep the gray look.

I started growing my mustache the day I graduated from high school and achieved a respectable full one fairly quickly. After a couple years I shaved it off...and hated being without it so much that two weeks later I started growing it back and have had a mustache ever since. Well over 30 years.

As a young man I was able to grow a full, if wiry and wild, mustache...but with age I find it more difficult to tame the mustache without trimming it to the point that it becomes too short and small. My mustache has grey in it, but still darker than my mostly white hair.

At various times I've also had short beards, full beards, goatees, and even sported a soul patch for a while. But my beard hair has gone almost 100% white so some of these looks just visually confirm what most already know...I'm old.

Normally I wouldn't give a damn what others think about my age...but we live in a world where there are increasingly more millennials in the work place, companies and management frequently seem to cater to the whims of these millennials, and I find myself competing for jobs and promotions with younger workers and management...and not fairing well.

In with the new, out with the old.

I had always planned on going for a handlebar mustache when I reached an age where I could pull it off...but my mustache color is fading and it is getting stringier and more difficult to grow a thick mustache...and when I combine the fact that my age is working against me in the workplace it looks like my handlebar plans are on hold for the foreseeable future.

I've never been afraid to show the white hairs that I have earned...and I don't consider myself vain...but I find myself wondering if I should now color my hair and facial hair just to level the playing field with the younger hip workers.

Aging is a bitch.

quote:

Originally posted by smithnsig:
Mine is turning grey. I don’t like the grey. Does Grecian Formula work on beards?

Cold Blue?

Started the mustache in summer of 1968, it's been there ever since. Met my future wife the same year and we've been together ever since.

It was a dark Tom Selleck type then, now it's the grey version of the same.

When I joined my Dept, I was informed that real cops have mustaches.
I have embraced that.

David 2012 Church Directory photo by David Casteel, on Flickr

I was without hirsute adornments (facial hair) all through school and my 20 years in USAF, but grew a mustache sometime in the early 1990s (I think), as a result of drawing one on my TI badge photo with a pen and deciding that I liked the look. This was before the days of digital photos, so I don't know exactly when this happened. The beard came about as a result of having had carotid artery surgery and being unable to shave one side of my face. This was in January 2006. As the beard grew and the face healed, my friends all said they liked it and I just kept it. For most of the year I keep the beard and mustache trimmed fairly short, but in October I let them grow so that by December I have a full white beard and look like Santa Claus--the little chorus I sing with at that time likes me to dress in a red shirt and Santa hat.

20161221_122135 by David Casteel, on Flickr
(The ladies are the nurses at a treatment center I visit weekly)

flashguy

I was drafted in '63 and got out the Army in 1966.
While in the Army I had to shave and put up with all kind of BS I wouldn't have while at home walking the streets. In '66 I grew a full beard and have had one ever since. My wife of 46 years and children, grand children have never seen me without a beard.

Yes it's a salt and pepper beard now like my hair. It started out black like my hair.

I quit shaving in the Nixon years. Assaulting my face daily with lethal semi sharp edges just wasn't pleasant.

John has a long one.

I got an early start on Movember... haven't shaved since the 24th before I headed off for surgery.

Have had a goatee all year, but now beard is same length as the rest.

quote:

Originally posted by smithnsig:
Mine is turning grey. I don’t like the grey. Does Grecian Formula work on beards?

Yes. There’s a version for beards where you brush it on.

However, I became allergic to the stuff. I’d brush it on and my face would start itching.

I've kept my facial hair for the majority of the last decade, minus a couple years in the food-service industry. The last time I shaved too much was a year or two ago and ended up buzzing it stubble. my kids saw me and pointed and laughed. everyone told me "ohhh, you're so baby-faced!" along with a myriad of other stupid comments. so I avoid shaving much at all now aside from a very occasional trim.

quote:

Originally posted by Ripley:
I know a girl in New Orleans....

I'm from Louisiana are you sure she's a girl in New Orleans?

More than a few tell me I look like Sam Elliott but it's only the mustache

I've had a mustache since I was in the service in the late 60s, but I can't grow a beard. Every time it gets to the 4-5 day point it starts itching & I shave it off.

I also swore that I was going to let my hair grow long when I got out of the Marines in 1970, but every time it got long enough to hang over the tops of my ears I couldn't take it & got a haircut.

Wore a beard for most of my adult life. Some years back it started bothering me so much I shaved it off.

I grew the mustache back because I couldn't figure out a good way to shave the upper lip.

Currently sport a short goatee.

My beard, as well as my hair, is completely grey.

Although my grey hair has never bothered me, I don't like grey beards. BUT I would never use any kind of color on GP!

quote:

Originally posted by charlie12:

I'm from Louisiana are you sure she's a girl in New Orleans?

I think I'm ok as she did have a mustache in her jeans.

I rocked a "porn 'stache" in the 80's, 90's and oughts. I let it all grow out into a full beard that I keep mostly trimmed very short in summer and let it get a bit "fuller" in the fall and winter.

Darndest thing happened to me last month though...maybe you guys can help...

My wife was hospitalized for a bit and I went to visit her daily. One day, when I got there, she's smiling and giggling. She explained that some of the younger care givers alternately asked her if I was her father and told her they thought she had a cute dad!

What do I do? Shave and look 20 years younger? Dump the wife (who is older than me BTW) and chase 40 year olds? Dye the heck out of it?

We both had a great laugh over it...although I get called the "cute dad" occasionally, I can live with it and embrace the Grey! I earned everyone of the little stinkers after all!

Had a goatee or beard when I was in plain clothes (the majority of my career).

Now, I'll let it grow out on vacation. The bad thing is, it takes me about 2, 2 1/2 weeks for it to come in nicely, then I have it for about 3 days before I need to shave and go back to work.

quote:

Originally posted by Gustofer:
There's no shame in being unable to grow a beard. Whatever you do, just don't be Keanu Reeves who thinks he can but can't.

Go for the moustache though. Embrace you inner Tom Selleck!

Very few guys, Tom Selleck being chief among them, can actually pull off a moustache only. Most end up looking like either a pederast, a prepubescent junior high-schooler or a 1970's porn actor. It's not a good look for most men, imho. Beards of some kind, again imho, are generally easier for guys to pull off, even if it's a goatee variant. Either way, best of luck to the OP. I grew my beard out several years ago & have no plans to shave it ever. Wear your face jacket!!

quote:

Originally posted by CPD SIG:
Had a goatee or beard when I was in plain clothes (the majority of my career).

Now, I'll let it grow out on vacation. The bad thing is, it takes me about 2, 2 1/2 weeks for it to come in nicely, then I have it for about 3 days before I need to shave and go back to work.

Our policy was that the standard military-trimmed moustache was acceptable, or a full beard was acceptable, but an officer could not report for duty un-shaven. Meaning the beard/moustache had to be fully in place, or else nothing.....no stubble or half-measures. Guys who wanted to grow one or the other (except those few who could legitimately just concentrate real hard and pop out whiskers) normally had to take time off to grow one, or do it while on vacation.