Gee, that boy can dance..but we're seated...and there's no music

Being in touch with an old friend has been a true pleasure.  I found him on Facebook and we've had a chance to reconnect.  A recent email exchange really took me back...

...it was 1993...  wow, I wasn't even 30 yet, but I was employed, I had a gym membership and four roommates in a three story Victorian house.

I was a regular at the gym and since I had very early commitments and very late commitments at the job I took very long lunches and worked out for hours at a time.  The best shape I have ever been in...

Juanito was one of my roommates.  He had been the manager of a video store and had a copy of nearly every movie that had ever been put on tape.  They lined the walls of his room in the house and he always had a movie playing...always...

Juanito and I had not been friends for very long and therefore did not have all the same friends - I'd known the other guys for a while and since we traveled in the same groups we knew all the same people...  so it was that he mentioned some girls he had met and a double date - was I interested?  I wasn't, I had recently split up with a fiance and well...  I said "Yes" anyway...

The date was set for a Saturday night - it was June - it was hot already...

I walked up to the gym from the house, got in a workout and headed home.  As I stood in the shower I was overcome by true insanity and, without explanation, decided to shave my chest.  I always kept a spare razor in the shower for the back of my neck and this was what I grabbed...  two scrapes and I was committed...  after four scrapes I was bleeding... after 10 scrapes I was late...

"We need to leave in 10 minutes!"

"What?"

It was madness.  Madness.  As I hacked away at my (what was later referred to as perfectly furred) chest, I realized I was in no way prepared for the task at hand.  They don't teach about this in school - no one says to trim it all first (although these days Gillette.com does have video shorts on body grooming-they are actually funny to watch)  It took forever and I had to sneak to my room for another razor in the middle of it all...

"Are you almost ready?"

"YES!"

"You're still in the shower!"

I'm almost done" I lied...

...after nearly a half hour my chest looked like I had a body full of bird-shot - nicks and cuts all over my torso.  I didn't know if I should try the toilet paper trick (you know little pieces to stop the bleeding or whether it would stop)...  I stared into my closet...  searching for the right shirt - it didn't have to look good, it just had to hide the blood seeping out of the open wounds on my chest...  All I had was a VERY dark, silky thing which I slipped into and then a pair of jeans...

...off we went...

"What's wrong?"

"What do mean?"

"You look uncomfortable..."

"I'm just stupid."

"For going on a double date?"

"Nope..."

And uncomfortable I was...

I do not remember anything that happened on the date.  I couldn't tell you if the girls were pretty or friendly, I don't know if the food was good or if we ate or went to a movie.  I don't know where we even went... except that it was somewhere about 8 hours away and it took even longer to get home...

...I was uncomfortable...

Let's start with the shirt choice...  the silky shirt was catching on the razor stubble every time I moved.  I tried pulling my shoulders forward to make my shirt hang away from my chest, but it didn't work...  I sat holding the front of my shirt away from my chest, but realized that I must have looked weird, so I simply sat back and leaned forward so that my shirt hung free...

and the shirt was hot

and the jeans were hot

and I sweat...  I can't help it...

and worse than the shirt, was the jeans...  Jeans are meant to be worn tight...  I firmly believe that.  Not so tight that you get varicose veins in your neck, but snug...  and I was in great shape and had jeans that I had no business owning...  and they were warm and I had shaved my chest...

if you ever decide to shave your chest remember this one thing...  you need ample time...

you need time to shave - which takes forever 

and you need time to rinse - which takes as long as it takes...  

As you shave, the chest hair runs down your body and while most of it goes to the drain, some of it catches in other body hair, below the chest...

...I was running late - it was bad enough that I had to completely shave my chest (couldn't put off finishing until tomorrow) which no one was going to see, but I had not taken the time to rinse all the chest hair out of my crotch...

The sweat, the hair, the jeans, the heat...  I couldn't sit still, I couldn't scratch...

I went nearly mad.

..and the more I resisted scratching the more I sweated - which only compounded the problem.

Juanito never invited me on a double date again...

After all the trouble, well, I kept my chest shaved that whole summer - which was easy after that...

You know...  at 28 a guy is just too smart to know how stupid he really is, and I'm not too proud to say that I was no exception.

-silly