The Strange Bastardry of Hair

The first time I realised that women had pubic hair was whilst watching an early episode of Minder in which Terry’s lust-interest of the week was a stripper.  (Believe it or not, Minder did start out with some proper-post-watershed scenes like that.)  That was a shocker.  I knew about boobs and bums at 10 years old, with a bit of a thing for Catwoman, Raquel Welch and the occasional Dr Who assistant; but I never would have imagined that any of these women kept something like that tucked away in their pants.

I say “tucked away” because the Minder stripper’s growler gave the impression that she’d half-inserted one of those troll-like Gonks between her legs.  A paradigm of 70’s vaginal fashion it was.

My hair-ducation (sorry) continued a year or three later thanks to Auf Wiedersehen, Pet.  Dennis had taken his German girlfriend swimming (Dagmar her name was, you know, with the eyebrows) and she raised her arms to rest against the side of the pool and what-do-you-know-it, she’s concealed the very same Gonk under each arm-pit.  I almost choked on my bag of Monster Munch.  Appalled by the idea that a woman could have hairy arm-pits, I appeased my outrage by resetting to a typical 80s xenophobic default position.  It was because she was German.  English women don’t have hairy arm-pits, but German women do.  A natural physiological difference caused by geographical displacement during evolution, I concluded (although not entirely in those actual words.)  This was later substantiated when German singer Nena got to number one in 1984 with 99 Red Balloons and shared her own under-arm version of the Black Forest with the Top of the Pops audience thanks to a sleeveless t-shirt and much arm-waving.

After this my teenage years brought me into contact with many a minge.  Not in reality of course, thanks to the sexually isolating environment of an all-boys’ Catholic school and my own crapness with women (see earlier post), but thanks to the soft-porn shelf of Hellenic Video in Green Lanes and the occasional illicitly-purloined Parade or Razzle magazine.  (I tended to steer clear of hard-core porn for the same reason that I dropped Biology before O’level.  There’s only so much anatomical detail I could stomach.)

And thus I was conditioned into considering my ideal woman to maintain a certain amount of growth down in the knicker region.  Which is partly why I don’t share the recent preference for a total absence of hair.  But I won’t judge.  It’s a matter of taste (metaphorically speaking of course.)  However, I am proudly narrow-minded and traditionally conditioned enough to pour heaps of scorn on MEN who shave their pubes off.  I have no logical reason for my disdain, so please don’t reply to my post with tales of tea-bagging and enhanced sexual what-have-you’s.   Gentleman, it’s up to you.  But what the fuck?

I looked down at myself in the bath this week and the question arose in my mind, if I were to shave my man’s penis garden, where would I stop?  Where would the borders be?  I’m only slightly hairier than average in general, but if I chose to wax my willy area, I’d be forced to keep nudging the border back until I reached both knees and neck.

As for the whole concept of a back-sack and crack wax, I can only cite one occasion on which such a state of baldness would have benefitted me, and it involved a particularly messy poo and the removal of an obstinate clagnet with a pair of nail scissors.  (Apologies if you just choked on YOUR bag of Monster Munch.)  My brother, who has an arse like Chewbacca, must have to keep a pair of shears down the side of his toilet for the same reason.

Really, the only decision I ever have to make is whether or not I keep my beard or shave it off for a few months.  It tends to be on a cycle dictated by own whims.  But since first sporting a beard, I have met with some prejudice.  I was horrified when a man once shouted to me from his car, “Fuck off your bearded wanker!”  I thought, what the fuck does my beard have to do with it?  And also, I was incredibly self-conscious going swimming with a beard if there were too many kids in the pool.  I thought I must look like a paedophile.  It would’ve been worse if I’d worn budgie-smuggler swimming trunks, or speados.

We do all have our prejudices in regard to hair.  One day it will be socially acceptable again to wear a moustache and not look like an 80s Liverpool player or mainstay on the gay club scene.  But until that time, you grow what you like, where you like and don’t mind me and my rants – but try to love the Gonk in your pants!