There are days when something slaps you in the face

As I age, I have more and more experiences where I feel like something has slapped me in the face. Sometimes it’s unpleasant, like the loss of a treasured possession to wear, breakage or theft. Others, it’s more like those little taps you see someone do in an old movie when they’re trying to bring someone who has passed out back to sensibility.

A good while back, you may remember I talked about going back to old-fashioned shaving with a safety razor. I wish I was still steady enough to use a straight razor, but the migraines have stolen a number of things from me, that level of steadiness of hand among them. At any rate, being a prepper, I had a stash of canned shaving crème, and I wasn’t about to waste the stuff, so I’ve been slowly using it up over time.

I’m just about out. It’s time to take the next step–back to a mug, brush and proper shaving soap. Off to Amazon. And then a couple of the add-ins I use to track prices zoom me off to eBay instead, because I can get the same nice badger hair brush there for a few bucks less. Color me frugal. I’m retired; the money doesn’t come in the same quantities any more.

In all truth, I should always have been so careful. I was once I found the tools, but I should have looked for them sooner. It’s worth keeping Chrome around to use Honey and Wikibuy. You can get Honey as a Firefox add-in I see when looking up the link for them. Options are good.

At any rate, I also need a mug. I guess I could just use a mug that’s sitting around the house, but there are also proper shaving mugs that fit shaving soap pucks. So I looked on Amazon and saw nothing I liked. I tried eBay, and found a far wider selection, including a lot of “vintage” ones, some inexpensive and some at unholy prices.

Then I was slapped in the face. Fortunately it was just the picture of a shaving mug and not the mug itself. But it was a blast from the far past, call it high school. When I was in high school, I was a total dork. Utter and complete. One of the many things that branded me a dork was a penchant for old ways. I carried a pocket watch for one thing. On a chain. And although people didn’t know it, I shaved with a straight razor and shaving soap that lived in a mug. I couldn’t find an old mug, so I bought a new one. It was an Old Spice mug, with the Cutty Sark on it. I used an old brush my dad had around for some reason or another.

I told you I was a dork.

So there I am, going through the mug shots, and there are some Old Spice mugs. They’re different from the one I had, and I kept going, looking for an old one that spoke to me. I found an old one that spoke to me. One exactly like the one I had, with a brush exactly like the one I used–a red and white Erskine brush. To make things even weirder, it’s local, about 30 miles away. It even comes with a note from the owner. Yes, it’s on the way.

I know my dad sold my old one in a yard sale. So what are the odds that this one is my old one? I’d say stupidly high. They must have made the things by the railroad car load, even back in the 70s.

But still that picture slapped me lightly in the face, and said “See here, boy. You may have been a dork, but don’t be an idiot.”

I’m learning to pay attention to slaps in the face and listen to quiet little voices in the night.