No woman wants to imagine a life with facial hair.

No woman wants to find a hairy upper lip or a short and curly sprouting from her chin.

No woman wants to drive-thru the Tim Horton’s line, walk into the hair salon to finally make an appointment, visit two stores sourcing the perfect birthday gifts for our niece and nephew, return home and notice a strange profile reflecting back at them from the hall mirror.

It wasn’t a chin hair that had me freeze in my tracks. It wasn’t the sun-kissed shadow of peach fuzz crying out to be waxed. It was the rounded tip of one of the baby’s rice crackers stuck like glue to the bottom of my chin as if I had intentionally set out to look like a garden gnome, one of Santa’s elves or a cruel Psych 101 experiment.

Thanks to all the staff and strangers for allowing me to continue to order, sip and browse through your stores without calling out my half inch goiter. This beard’s for you.