I started shaving when I was seven-years-old. I didn’t really have to shave at that point, I guess, but a few weird man hairs were popping up on my face, maybe earlier than some of the other kids. Okay, I wasn’t seven, but it was a little young. I’d always been advanced in terms of physical size and irrational embarrassment, though not so much in mental prowess or emotional maturity.

Basically, upon reflection, I remember getting man-hairier sooner than most of the other boys my age... which seemed cool to me for about two minutes.

My dad, glorious man-stache aside, shaved very regularly. Perhaps everyday. He went over some tips of shaving with me, telling me that I could shave down with the grain, as my facial hairs were fine and wouldn’t put up much of a struggle. For some reason, this insulted me, as if he were saying that my face hair was kind of wimpy or weak. “I’ll show him!” I thought. “I’ll have crazy thick hair on my face that grows faster than my contempt and twice as wiry!”

And, unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened.

As my burgeoning shaving career continued, I started becoming interested in electric razors. I don’t know why, they just seemed manlier. Images of a busy business man in his shirt and tie, walking around the office, the buzz of his electric razor clipping his whisker as he read documents for the upcoming board meeting or whatever, really appealed to me. I wanted to be like that guy.

In addition, like many face shaving males, I couldn’t shave without nicking something, and electric razors were supposedly so hella easy that supposedly that wasn’t a concern. Just a quick, on the go shave with no mess or burns or blooooood. Sounded good to me, and I made my desire for an electric razor known.

On some birthday, either mine or Jesus’s, maybe when I was a teenager or maybe actually still a pre-teenager of some sort, my folks bestowed upon me the gift of an electric razor. It was one with the straight, oscillating blades -- not one with the three circle blade things that I wanted for no discernable reason. Still, I was excited until I tried to use it. It sucked. The shave sucked, it was weird, and the only thing sucky about it was everything about it. My parents weren’t to blame, as they’d gotten me what I wanted, but I still felt guilty when I put the razor in a drawer and never reached for it again.

In the ensuing years, I went back to the safety razor blade and shaving cream technique. It still sucked, and I broke out when going against the grain, as was now necessary for any kind of close shave due to my dream of having tough, manly facial hair unfortunately coming true. Sometimes I’d just shave with the grain, because my Granddaddy told me, during some shaving related outbreak, that you only need that smooth shaving against the grain shave if you’re going to be kissing a girl. Well, I’ve been in luck for a while now when it comes to that! No reason for that extra painful against the grain shave for… a long, long… long time now! Wait. Did I type “luck”?

The fact is that shaving has always been one of my least favorite activities, and, as such, I have often sported various kinds of facial hair, from a beard to just constant scruff.

Recently, though, I noticed that my various bosses at work, the ones belonging to the male gender, seemed to be clean-shaven everyday. I’d see them, often with their shirts pressed and tucked in, faces smooth, and then look at myself: slovenly, wrinkled shirt untucked, face covered in various stages of beard growth. This was not the face of a professional who might move up in the world.

It was time for a change.

I decided that the way to become a success was to shave everyday. I did it a few days in a row, but it didn’t last. The razor burn, the occasional nicks, weird neck outbreaks, the mess -- it all really was bullcrap.

Then two friends of mine, on separate occasions, sang the praises of the electric razor. No mess! No burn! No cuts! No fuss! Just a nice, clean, fast shave.

That sounded like the kind of shaving experience I could handle, but I couldn’t get the vague memories of thinking electric razors were shit from back in my youth when I probably didn’t really even need to shave, come to think of it. Silly boy, wanting to grow up in the dumbest, shittiest of ways.

Dismissing my own experience and feelings, instead believing in the words of others more than what I already knew to be true, I purchased an electric razor. This time I indulged my dreams and got one of those rotating blade ones, or whatever, with the three circular… things… in triangle formation for … whatever reason.

So, leery due to the fact that I knew electric razors suck, I tried it out. And it was like a goddamn cheese grater to my neck! What in hell? The booklet insisted that one needs to give an electric razor three weeks because it takes the face and hair time to get used to a new kind of shaving or something, but this just plain sucked. Lots of missed hair after shaving and shaving and shaving, this shave that I used to imagine as quick and convenient now somehow taking thrice as long as my struggles with the regular safety blade.

I looked worse than ever shaving-wise! Random patches of missed hairs amidst the razor burn and occasional cuts… and the pain! Good lord, it really stung. None of this would be worth if even if it were a good shave, and it decidedly was not. Aside form the glaringly obvious missed patches, even the areas that seemed to get shorn pretty well (my big, flat Irish cheeks mostly) felt like sandpaper to the touch.

This column is being written during week two of electric razor shaving. Week three will come well before this is due, ergo, I shall pause for a week or so, then return to this fascinating tale with the results. My current prediction is that I’ll still hate the electric razor and want to get a refund because it was expensive as hell, especially for something that sucks and hurts my damn face…

ONE WEEK LATER…

So, as I’m trying to decide whether or not I’m going to return the electric razor due to shitty shaves… Not as torn up, but my face is like sandpaper immediately after cheese grating myself with that damn thing, and I make the decision: I don’t want this. Electric razors aren’t for me. The company has a sixty-day return policy, but I can’t find my receipt!

Do I send it back to the manufacturer anyway in good faith? Do I take it back to the store?

None of that matters, because I forgot that me and my roommate’s cleaning lady (yes, we have a cleaning lady even when we struggle to pay bills, and I can’t buy comics every week anymore) was scheduled to come in today, and it seems she tossed the store bag with the packaging for the razor. Can’t return it. That decision is made.

So, I went ahead and bought blades for my old “safety” razor anyway, deciding to eat the sixty bucks for a half way decent shave.

Lessons learned…

1. Change is bad. Even though I was unsatisfied with the safety blade shaves and resulting razor burn, I should’ve realized that getting an electric razor/shaver/whatever would suck… just in a different yet similar way.

2. Shaving is bullshit. Ladies, is it this rough on the legs and armpits? Because face shaving is bullshit. It is like the shit of a bull, and I hate it

3. There is no 3. What? … Leave me alone!!! I gotta go shave…