Archive for the ‘goatee’ tag
There is Treasure Within Hidden in the Shadows
R.G.L. Forty Years ago
This is an old photo taken forty years ago beside a northern lake somewhere in western Canada. The beard is gone as is the hat which I made. Even the trim, youthful body is gone and in its place is that of a slightly overweight somewhat shorter man.
It is strange to think that forty years ago I was a man with a head full of dreams and a woman at my side who was willing to travel through life while I chased these dreams, a woman with dreams of her own. Today, I still have dreams and I am still chasing them as is the woman who has remained at my side these forty years. The beard lasted for twenty-five years and was traded in for a goatee which stayed in place for another twelve years. Now, I keep only a mustache and sometimes even that is questionable in terms of survival value.
The beard, the goatee and the mustache are all parts of various uniforms I wore as a statement of who I was. One thing I have learned, slowly, is that who I am, my self-identity has nothing to do with facial hair or body weight or age. The core that dreamed in 1971 is still the same core found within still dreaming in 2011.
As I gain a bit more awareness of the reality of my central self, something that seems to come only in the minutest of bits and pieces, I am discovering that the shadows of my youth are still the same shadows of my later years. The repressed contents of childhood and youth are just peeking out as I disturb the complexes which are welded to these contents. And to my surprise, the gifts of my youth are still there. All it takes is a willingness to allow them to come into the light where they can flourish.
