Thread: Reflecting: How did we get here?

I was sick of shaving - this disdain lead to worse and worse shaves as I worked harder and harder to shorten the process in an effort to not allow it to encumber my life.

Sick of shaving is an understatement. Stating I hated it would not be too strong.

Wife started putting out the signals. "Wow! Did you even shave today?"

The only thing that was challenging enough to enable me to want to shave well, was a DE and then in short order a straight. That challenge and the notion that it's rather bad-assed and not performed by the majority sold me.

The wife is well pleased - shaving now takes me forever comparatively speaking, but its become a pleasure.

For 1 I hated shaving. I would go days without shaving. For 2 I was looking for something to start collecting. I pictured straight razors because I figured I can collect them at the same time use them. Now even though I'm a newbie I can't wait to shave! I actually look forward to it. Just got my first scuttle and can't wait to use it tonight. Now I have a nice little collection that's usable and I'm happy all around!

I started shaving when I was thirteen, and hated it from day one. I started with the trac 2 and canned barbasol and it was nothing but irritation from the start. All through school I avoided shaving if at all possible, I tried everything type of foam or gel or rub on cream, even a brush and vdh, though I didn't know how to get a lather at the time. Tried and rejected and then tried every one.

When the three blades came out, I used them, skipped the 4 and hung on till the 5s came. No difference. Sometime in high school I started getting the ingrown hairs to boot. I generally only shaved about once a week if I could help it, though I did three full passes every time I did shave.

I've never worked a job where I've had to be clean shaven, so that was an advantage, I suppose. Though I tried to be clean shaven for going out to meet women on the weekends. :-D

As soon as I was 18 and moved out of my mother's house I grew the Van Dyke that I've always felt like I should have. But that led to another problem, the inability to get a decent clean line at the edges. That led me to an electric razor to line the edges and to shave once a week with, to augment my Friday evening blade shave. The electric was just horrific, so I soon gave that up.

I've always been a lover of knives and blades, and so have since I was little I had wanted a straight razor, like I saw in the movies. Especially so after having a barber line my neck after a haircut a few times in school. But I didn't think they had been made in a long time, and had no idea of how to get an old one. So it just remained an idea in the back of my mind, and I suffered through.

The last seven years or so, my routine has been a beard in the winter, long goatee in the summer. Shaving only as often as my girlfriend prompted me to. Followed by gallons of after shave and lotion to soothe the burn. Then a needle and tweezers the next day to get all the flat hairs that stayed against my skin and refused to be cut.

I hated it, but stuck with it as it was the best I'd been able to find. Pretty good prep actually, just a thick fast growing flat to my skin, no regular grain pattern, nightmare to shave with a cartridge.

Then last October my best friend for the last 30 years came to town for business and handed me a straight. His great uncle had been a barber and died years before, but two straights had been found in one of his boxes. So my friend brought me one of them.

It was rusty as hell, but I had the tools to clean it up, and did. Looking into figuring out how to sharpen it led me here.

Now I've got a handful of stones and fifteen or maybe more razors. And I love it, and I love shaving now too!

Crap, didn't realize that was so long. Sorry.

It's interesting to read other peoples start up stories...

Me and a buddy were sitting around talking about how expensive the cartridge razors were. I went on a long winded sermon about how we're getting screwed by "The Man". And how if there were a way to never buy another cartridge razor again, I'd do it. I mean come on!!! It's thousands of dollars they're screwing me out of, just cause my face grows hair!! I could pay the 6 grand for permanent electrolysis and STILL save money over the course of my life!! I tend to get carried away sometimes. He informed me that he saw a straight razor for sale on Amazon or something. The wheels started turning... After he left, I started googling, and SRP was at the top of my search results. Two days later, after lots of reading, I ordered a kit from Whippeddog. Take that, "The Man"!!!

Originally Posted by maddafinga

Crap, didn't realize that was so long. Sorry.

I even read it .....I keep mine short cuz it would take me all friggn night to type that much. LOL

My little brother bought a DE to try and save money, I couldn't have him doing something more "manly" than me.

The result was turfing cartridge razors for a couple of straights from whipped dog.

That showed him!

Since then I've purchased a couple more razors and a set of hones. Haven't put a blade to stone yet but will soon.

Originally Posted by maddafinga

Crap, didn't realize that was so long. Sorry.

I am going to wait for the next chapter to come out. It's good so far.

Originally Posted by regularjoe

Me and a buddy were sitting around talking about how expensive the cartridge razors were. I went on a long winded sermon about how we're getting screwed by "The Man". And how if there were a way to never buy another cartridge razor again, I'd do it. I mean come on!!! It's thousands of dollars they're screwing me out of, just cause my face grows hair!! I could pay the 6 grand for permanent electrolysis and STILL save money over the course of my life!! I tend to get carried away sometimes. He informed me that he saw a straight razor for sale on Amazon or something. The wheels started turning... After he left, I started googling, and SRP was at the top of my search results. Two days later, after lots of reading, I ordered a kit from Whippeddog. Take that, "The Man"!!!

Next thing you know you'll be growing your own food, making hammers, all kinds of stuff The Man will hate. :<0) You got guns don't ya ?