Glorious Facial Hair Choices

Dear Readers,

For those of you who may not know, I grew up (largely [that was an unintentional, but hilarious weight pun, you can laugh]) in a small, but ever expanding, town called Grants Pass. Feel free to look it up. I then decided I was done with the small town feel and jumped into Portland to go to school. It is because of this that I still find something new and exciting in the inhabitants of this city.

As I was walking to class the other day I saw something that was, in all truth, nothing out of the ordinary. It was a man who was making a questionable facial hair choice. He had, what is called, a neckbeard. This is, as you can imagine, a beard which one grows on the neck. This is not a new trend:



The very well known writer, Henry David Thoreau sported one, at least for a time.

This, however, does not make the style any less questionable.

For one man, though, my opinion of the neckbeard has changed. It was just after I had gotten off of the elevator with the woman who could not move her head. I was walking across the street, toward the building that I needed to enter. That is when I saw him.

Generally, the men you encounter sporting a neckbeard look serious, perhaps even a bit somber. Not this man, no. He had a small smile on his face, as if the universe was going his way that day. He wore a hood, as if to signify that he was part of the prestigious and glorious Order of Neckbeardedness. The smile on his face could only mean one thing. After his classes, when the sun started to set on our fair city, he became a masked hero. Oh yes, there is a smile that denotes that. Perhaps he is not the hero that this city deserves, but the one that we need. The one who keeps our children safe during the darkest of nights. 

Thank you, masked neckbeard man. Thank you