Fact One: my father and my brother both wear mustaches, and have worn them almost all their lives.
Fact Two: possibly because of Fact One, I don’t like mustaches, and have steadfastly refused to grow them. Once, during the early 90s, I sported a goatee for a few months, but I was young and reckless and have been cleanshaven since then.
Fact Three: my son, Gavin, has a paralyzing fear of mustaches. Whenever he sees my brother or my dad (or anybody else with one, for that matter,) his lips quiver, and his whimpers of fear quickly turn into howls of bloodcurdling, inconsolable terror.
Nothing can be done about this. Any sort of family gathering has become a painful ordeal, with no end in sight, as both my dad and my bro refuse to shave their ’staches off, not wanting to bow to the will of an unreasonable seven-month-old. I don’t blame them, but as Gav’s father I feel somewhat responsible for his condition.
So, I ask you: what do I do? Should I continue as normal and hope he grows out of his fear at some undetermined point in the future? Or do I go against all taste and personal principle and (horrors) grow a mustache myself? Or do I compromise and regrow the goatee, hoping that the newfound goatee confidence somehow carries over to the mustache? What do you think?
