[Secret Journal] Scratching an Itch (or Not)

8:00 pm. Sunday - So many itches I cannot contain! -- I will bust! It's over! No, wait, stylistically I cannot start with the climax and give up. Must bear and forbear, must be patient. My impatience points to truth of pursuit, not falsity. Simply scratch as always, I have 61 years of ingrained habit, Lord Itch rules the temple.

8:10 pm. Sunday - The last 10 minutes have been a roller coaster ride, wooden, not safety-tested, really rattled my bones. Centered in non-itch new beginning, having scratched till I'm raw in places. Took BIC pen to right ear, smaller than finger, not recommended, certainly, but no one was looking. The things I do in the dark! Clean slate, blank slate, one little itch under eyes, then they creep in and subsume consciousness. I'm lost!

8:28 pm [day unspecified] - What's it been, 20 minutes? Rome wasn't built in 20 minutes, I guess. There's no reason to keep counseling patience, I already know that. This harping on patience is making me more impatient. Counsel mercy, which, apart from a possible first mention, is only truly mercy when it's not mentioned. OK, mercy for myself, still busy scratching. What I need is one decent concentrated itch spot, of my choosing, not a million popping up everywhere. What kind of universe is this, for pity's sake?

8:29 pm Sunday - Brief entry to say, the universe, the world is mercy -- pity, if you will -- I'm not separate. You can't think continental drift, tectonic movement, doesn't itch like hell. That's why we have earthquakes, the Logos rolling over to scratch. Merciful to itself. Giving credence to my theories.

11:00 pm Sunday - Must've dozed off. Dreamed I was on the ground floor of a massive itch, turned out to be a volcano. False alarm?

5:30 am Monday - Woke up scratching, might wear oven mitts today, hands up like a surgeon, reminding myself to break the cycle. That's it, I'm just unconscious through habit (cf. above, Lord Itch, Temple.) Who is this f'n Lord Itch? How did I come to serve him? Who's his consort? Is she worse, prodding him from behind? "Exact tribute from him, you worm!" she cries, calling the Lord a worm? Who is this massive B? Called Lady, probably. Lady Scratch? I guess that's it, men always want to scratch their itch, and Lord Itch just happened to fall for Lady Scratch, etc. "I got you under my skin." Making progress, this has a whole mythic basis!

6:30 am Monday - Finished coffee, my head a lot clearer, scratch that Lady Scratch stuff, unintentional pun, I swear. Scratch that, too ... Oops, did it again. Lady Scratch has now infected my vocabulary, my thought process. More coffee, gulping it down between these pen scratchings, no!!!! Must reclaim temple, especially new deity of my own choosing.

6:43 am Monday - Every developing world/cosmic view starts as experience, then mythologizes in upward ascent, making sense and also making palpable. All I've got so far is the itch point likened to black hole or nucleus, and conjecturing that entering (through consciousness) at that point might (likely?) be a different realm of consciousness. Not realm so much, bad word, too early for mythologizing itch point as kingdom.

7:03 am Monday - Thinking about blog today. Time to throw out some red meat. Maybe crumbs. Nose suddenly itching, think I see Heaven.

Bearded Men Never Get Them Wet

You've probably noticed this, you've never seen a bearded man when it's raining.

It took me a while to realize it, but I've never personally had a beard so I haven't been privy to this information. But the more I looked around, the more suspicious I became.

And I can think back, like to college. Anytime there was the slightest chance of rain, guess who'd be absent? The one or two guys with beards. And ask yourself, have you ever been to a wedding where the groom fails to show up, and you know he has a beard and it's raining? Maybe the bride doesn't even know what's going on. There she was, all packed up and ready to go, a fresh set of sheets in the trunk, and the Bearded Wonder stood her up!

The more popular my blog becomes, the more connections I'm been able to make. And in this case, one day I put the word out, all very hush hush, that I wanted to do a story on the subject. At first, it was like I trying to get the combination to Fort Knox; everyone darted their eyes, people left the room, and an especially devout barista crossed herself. The hush was deafening, I had to leave.

But a friend followed me and motioned me into an alley, whispering to meet him later at such and such a place at the fire escape in back, to bundle up in a coat so I was disguised, and to come alone. He knew a guy with a beard who might be open to talking -- he had a terminal illness and nothing left to lose -- and since we were expecting rain that afternoon, he'd have to be home. Of course I was nervous, but I went. Up the stairs we climbed. He knocked a coded knock and we were escorted in. They frisked me for any water I might've had on me, then led me to an inner chamber. A bearded man with an IV sat wasting away.

He was actually eager to talk, and quickly spilled the truth that water is lethal to a beard of any length. If you go wet/dry, wet/dry, wet/dry, you've only got a limited number of times you can do it. There's no guarantees and there's no do-overs. Keeping a beard dry never hurts it, but if goes from wet to dry, there's something about the whiskers that makes them constrict. Then, without air being able to circulate through them, they mat and tighten up around the throat, often suffocating the wearer. Even a shorter beard can constrict so tightly that the face pulls in and shrivels up to about the size and texture of a walnut.

I asked, "What about taking a shower?" He waved it off as an impossibility. "What about taking a bath?" He said, yes, they can bathe, if -- and this is a big IF -- if they use strict precautions. Such as, naturally, keeping the water shallow and their beards as far from it as possible. Obviously, they can't wash their hair, etc. I started putting two and two together and asked if they could go swimming. He said that was a big NO, because the same principle was at work: Getting the beard wet in a swimming pool would present the same identical problem as a bathtub, rain, water balloon fights, and squirt guns. I nodded, as if to say, "Just as I suspected, but thank you for clarifying."

With the interview essentially over -- I got what I came for -- I asked my source why it was all such a big secret? The fire escape, the disguises, etc. The answer was it came down to pride. Beard wearers like to think they're hot stuff. The beard gives them that professorial look. They tend to drink wine, smoke pipes, read books with footnotes, and wear outdated, baggier suits, all very intellectual. I know I for one hate getting into an argument with a guy wearing a beard, because I know he's going to show me up in front of everyone. So it's pride. But, like Samson, their power's in their beard, but their beard is so vulnerable, their supposed superiority is all a sham!

We bid each other a respectful goodbye. I went forth knowing that now I could even the playing field with all these Bearded Wonders. Who knows -- who really knows? -- when I might just be in a restaurant and get clumsy with a pitcher of water when one walks by? "Oh, sorry!" I'll say, as he goes running for the shears!

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THE PICTURE is of Vol Tapley in 1897, whose beard was 9 foot, 2 inches long. Some sources say 11 foot. I'd love to go back in time and give him a good dousing and watch him shrivel up to nothing!