How did it ever come to this? What happened to "Mr Simplicity"?...The guy
who lived happily for years with only 2 razors, 1 strop, a barber hone and
an Arkansas stone? He was the guy who could put everything he owned
into a pick-up truck. He did just fine, but he doesn't live here anymore.
Over the last several years, I have acquired quite a few razors...and hones,
strops, soaps and creams: RAD, HAD, and SAD. The other day, when I realized
that I had run out of storage space for all this shaving paraphernalia,
I decided that it was high time to cull the herd. So I had to ask myself:
How do you do that? It's all good stuff, right? Are you ready to let go of some
of your treasure? How do you decide what to keep? Are you really sure you can
do this in some sensible way? What do you do with the culls? Sell them? How?
Give them away? To whom?
The first thing I had to decide was this: Am I a utilitarian shaver or a collector?
I ended up deciding to be a little of both, but mainly a practical shaver. Starting
with the razors, I began by creating 4 categories:
1) The razors I seldom use, or don't really like for one reason or another
2) The razors I tend to favor, the ones I use all the time
3) The really pretty ones, the ones with custom scales mostly
4) The ones I just can't part with for personal reasons...like the one I'm
saving for my brother, or the one a good friend gave me.
That scheme didn't result in much of a cull, so I decided that I would only
keep those razors that were easy to maintain. I set aside the "problems"...
the ones that required honing gymnastics or some unusual preservation
treatment. There were a few of those, so even if they were good shavers,
they had to go.
So, now we're down to the "best of the best" choices. At this point, I had to
seriously re-consider what I wanted to end up with in terms of a useful and
manageable rotation. I decided on a seven-day arrangement.
I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but one 7-day set didn't seem like enough.
So, one 7-day set isn't enough, but five is too many. How about four sets
of 7? That way, in rotation, I would use each razor once every 4 weeks, right?
At this point in time (Thanks, Glen), I had to REALLY get serious about this
project...this was the hard part.
I took a long look at the remaining stock, gritted my teeth, and decided on
two 7-day sets, plus a few special keepers. That hurts a bit, but I'll get over it.
I had to remind myself about why I'm doing this in the first place: too much
stuff...cull the herd. So much for the razors, now the rest of the excess gear.
The soaps and creams were easy: three or four give-aways, but I'll eventually
use the rest...maybe in 3 or 4 years. Aftershaves were easy, too: I really only
have 3 that I like. Brushes likewise: I only have 2 good ones, and I'll keep
them both.
What about strops? Do I really need 7? No...one goes to my nephew, and
I'm still not sure about the fire hose linen I just bought. But I'm not giving up
the Roo hide strop that MickR made for me, or the Tony Miller, or the SRD
hard felts...I use them all the time. And the 2 inch roo hide roll-up stays in
the travel kit.
Finally, we're down to the honing gear. That was easy, too. I'm only willing to
part with a duplicate Norton 4k/8k. And even that one just gets moved into
the kitchen, for sharpening cutlery. I'll keep the Naniwa 1K-12K line-up, the
Zulu Gray, the 10 inch black Arkie, and the 2 pasted bench strops. Also, I have
3 barber hones, and I'll just keep the one 3-line Swaty along with the 6 inch
translucent Arkansas stone...the same 2 stones I started out with, 50 years ago.
So, it turned out to be not much of a cull after all...razors, mostly. I guess
I'll see if I can sell them...if my will power holds out.
Good bye, Mr Simplicity!
