Beards are in these days. Scruffy beards, huge beards, barely there beards, well coiffed beards and hipster “touch of a beard.” Well, I’ve had a beard for 43 years. I grew mine as a sophomore in college, it sprung from my fu manchu mustache to goatee to full-on beard. Many of my family members, including my wife and daughter, and friends have never “seen” me without a beard. I’ve had a beard for over two-thirds of my life. So in the name of lumberjacks and other facial hair aficionados, I’d like to dispel some beard falsehoods and add some biased beard truths.

1. Most of us shave, some like me everyday. Some of us keep a clean edge to our beard and some don’t like the neck beard thing. So throwing the razor away, in most cases, is a myth.
2. We don’t need less napkins when we eat, we need more. We also need a good “food in your beard” partner to point out when we have ketchup in our beard. See non-beards can feel that shit on their skin, we need other eyes on it or a napkin-wipe after every bite.
3. They don’t itch. When people say to you “doesn’t that thing itch”?, it’s because they can’t grow one. Beard envy is a horrible thing.
4. Most us us get our beard trimmed as often as your get your hair cut. You may not be able to tell it, but we do. Finding the right professional that can give you a beard trim that looks like you didn’t get a beard trim is a gift. When you find one, as I have (thank you Bonnie), you never leave.
5. We shampoo and condition our beards. See #2, all the shit that falls on your beard needs to be washed out. EVERYDAY. Because of that we also need our beard to be conditioned so it doesn’t dry out and get, now wait for it, split ends. My wife has now turned me on to “beard oil”, bless her heart. Look it up, it’s real and wonderful.
6. Beards do not make you warmer in the winter nor more comfortable in the summer, they just make you cooler.
7. They have a surprise factor. A beard can be any damn color it wants to be and you have no control over it. I’ve seen dirty blond haired men have a red ginger beard, I’ve seen dark haired men have blond beards, I’ve seen gray beards on 20 year olds, and the one I respect the most is when the mustache is a totally different color than the beard. Weird but cool.
8. I’ve never understood the Amish or Lincoln beard, you know the beard without a mustache. It’s oddly incomplete and I feel somehow the wearer is judging me harshly.
9. Chicks don’t really dig beards.  ‘Nuff said.