Sweet Sweat

I sometimes still read the comics section of the newspaper. As a child, I had a few favorites: "Fox Trot," "Garfield," and "For Better or For Worse" for some unknown reason. I generally avoided the strips drawn with any actual artistic talent (see Mary Worth and Judge Parker) - the storylines were too dramatic and the drawings too Lichtenstein-esque for my young mind.

When I was in the 2nd grade, a conversation in the carpool ride on the way home turned to the topic of comic strips. Being the youngest of the group, and desperately wanting to fit in, I piped up and claimed to be a follower of "Cathy," a comic strip in which I never displayed much interest, but thought it was a mature choice anyway (should have stuck with "For Better or For Worse"). My so-called preference was immediately met with jeers and yelps of dismay and this is when I exited the conversation and spent the rest of the ride home brooding and staring out the rear window of the Volvo station wagon, looking wistfully at the other drivers on the highway, wishing I could be in their car because I was sure that they would appreciate "Cathy."

I never did get into "Cathy," most likely because of the carpool disaster, but over the years I have had the opportunity to learn a little about Cathy's life and I have to say that she strikes me as quite a neurotic one. I gather she has landed herself a husband at last, but who knows whether or not she will ever end her plight of fitting into that coveted bikini. I feel like "Cathy" is intended to be the comic strip to which every modern woman can relate; the comic strip that is meant to be taped on the refrigerator right next to a postcard of 3 comically-dressed older ladies on pogo sticks.

I revisited "Cathy" one recent morning and saw that she was still burdened by her usual woes - namely, food! While there were many things of note in this strip (namely, the lack of actual humor), the thing that struck me the most was the last panel. A liquid seemed to be spouting from Cathy's head. Using context clues, I could only assume the liquid in question was sweat. I sifted through the recycling and checked out a couple more "Cathy" strips. Lo and behold, Cathy was sweating in several of the panels!! She wasn't even sweating. No, she was projectile sweating! Whenever Cathy became a little flustered, large beads of sweat leapt off her body like lemmings throwing themselves off a bridge. I looked up "excessive sweating" on medicinenet.com and it appears Cathy suffers from hyperhidrosis, "a common disorder which produces a lot of unhappiness." This is what they said:

Sweating is embarrassing, it stains clothes, ruins romance, and complicates business and social interactions. Severe cases can have serious practical consequences as well, making it hard for people who suffer from it to hold a pen, grip a car steering wheel, or shake hands.

No wonder Cathy is so unhappy! She can barely hold a pen in her hand! I get it now! The website even recommended undergoing surgery to treat this embarrassing disorder which may be a sign of thyroid disease (!). Who will take care of Electra when Cathy dies of thyroid disease?

Clothing:Body::Mustache:Face ?

Stache, tache, tash, mo, muzzy, nose neighbor... all common abbreviations for the facial hair that rests so snugly against the upper lip: The Mustache. The Mustache must not be confused with The Beard. Indeed, a beard takes over an entire face whereas the mustache lies on the face like a comfortable afterthought - kind of like it was forgotten during the shaving process but the gentleman thought "Hey, I kind of like you. Stay awhile!"

Throughout history, many significant figures have sported mustaches: Edgar Allan Poe, Friedrich Nietzsche, Albert Einstein, the Mario Brothers... Today, though, mustaches seem to be much less common than they were in the past. The American Mustache Institute argues that when the "Me Decade" ended, so did America's respect for the mustache. AMI points out that in the 1970s, a mustache was seen as a luscious, respectable addition to one's face whereas today, the mustache is seen as an ironic, trendy novelty. And a discriminated one at that. A recent poll showed that half of American women would refuse to kiss a mustached man. In 2006 the US Supreme Court ruled that it was permissible for a trial lawyer to throw someone off a jury using the pretext that they have a moustache. Now, consider this excerpt from The Mustache by Guy de Maupassant written in 1883:

[... ] a man without a mustache is no longer a man. I do not care much for a beard; it almost always makes a man look untidy. But a mustache, oh, a mustache is indispensable to a manly face. No, you would never believe how these little hair bristles on the upper lip are a relief to the eye and good in other ways.

Got it. The mustache was an important attribute to a true man's face. Read on...

Imagine placing to your lips a piece of dry--or moist--parchment. That is the kiss of the man without a mustache. It is not worth while. [...] There is no love without a mustache!

What happened here?! Where did this love for the mustache go? According to "research" performed by AMI, mustaches were most widely accepted between 1969 and 1982. Is it possible that American men, in an attempt to cleanse themselves of the sequined rollercoaster ride that was the 1970s, shaved their mustaches as wishful thinking for the coming decade?

My father wore a mustache until 1985. I did not know him when he was sporting what I have come to learn is named the "Fu Manchu." I conducted a short interview with my dad via e-mail to find out a little more about the mustache that I have only known through family photos that were taken before I joined the family, of course. In my photographic research, I have come to the conclusion that my dad shaved a few months before I was born. There he is, in October of 1985, standing beside my mother with her ballooning belly, mustache revealing a hint of teeth. But then there he is, in late February of 1985, sitting behind the gargantuan lobster the hospital provided him for his celebratory "My Daughter Was Born Today" dinner, sporting a smile that is comparatively blinding, no facial hair shielding his grin at all. According to my dad, he shaved because "It was just time for a change." Could his sentiments reflect those of other American men in the early to mid-1980s who had been growing mustaches since their late teen years? And of the American populace in general during the mid-80s?