By Samuel Torrey
Staff Writer
A low hum. A faint stirring. Then… the ‘stache. Yes, the year 2025 has arrived, and with it, a strange and hairy evolution. From the primordial fuzz to the majestic handlebar, witness “2025: A Stache Odyssey,” where the only monolith is a well-groomed upper lip.
The ‘stache, it seems, has become more than just a trend; it’s a source of empowerment. From tentative peach fuzz to carefully sculpted handlebars, students are finding a newfound sense of self in their facial hair.
“It makes me feel confident,” Junior Wendel Islar said, “I feel like I’d look like a baby without it.”
Others stress this feeling, mentioning how their mustaches make them feel older and like a man, which for some is a blessing and a curse.
“It makes me feel grown.” Junior Avery Hargrove said, “But it also makes me look like a man, which sometimes isn’t always the best.”
In these early stages of manhood, every mustache hopeful has to struggle through those rough first days of mustache. Unfortunately, not every stache is the work of art each man hopes it to be.
“You know some people can pull it off,” Islar said. “But some people… well, it makes them look kinda horrible, especially in the early stages of growing a mustache.”
Sometimes, when looking at some people’s staches, do they groom their mustaches or just let them run rampant, like tiny, furry escapees from a lip-sized zoo? To be Reynolds ready, a little light grooming is a must.
“Yeah, I end up brushing it from time to time.” Hargrove said, “Mostly when I come out of the Shower, though, cause that’s when it’s the worst.”
The official grooming regiment only comes out after shower-induced panics and if it looks like there is a squirrel nest in it. Our pioneers of facial hair are boldly going where few combs have gone before. If you find yourself with a stache as wild and untamed as the bamboo down at the cut, here are some grooming tips that will make even the fiercest whiskers photo-ready.
- Keep that sucker trimmed: Don’t be afraid to procure some mustache scissors or beard trimmers to keep it sculpted.
- Moisturize and cleanse: Find a good beard wash specifically formulated to moisturize and cleanse those face follicles. No one wants to face the vast expanse of high school savagery with Cheeto dust caught in the stache.
- Wax, Balm, or other styling gel. Your mustache, like the hair on your head, needs to be sculpted into a picture-perfect form that will hold all day.
One of the most challenging parts about being a high school whisker warrior is the lack of heroic models to help pave the way.
“No, honestly,” Islar said, “I like how my own mustache looks, I don’t need anyone to look up to”
If you don’t have the confidence of Islar, there are many great examples in media to follow, Great mustache artists, such as Hulk Hogan, Sam Elliot, Tom Selleck, Ron Swanson, And, of course, Mario and Luigi.
Hopefully, though, you are lucky enough to have a hometown hero who can inspire you to boldly traverse the whisker wilds.
“Yes, my friend Mathew from camp,” Hargrove said, “It’s like a firefighter’s mustache, I aspire to get a mustache like that one day.”
Firefighters are the true mustache heroes, they save lives while easily rocking the coolest-looking mustaches this side of the Atlantic. Though the real question everyone’s dying to know do our whiskered knights name their friends above their lips?
“Joshua,” Islar answered after thinking for a moment, “I don’t know why, it just seems like a Joshua.”
Interestingly enough, I could see where he was coming from, his mustache did weirdly seem like a Joshua… But what about our other guy, does his mustache have its own title?
“Huh… I guess not,” Hargrove said “I have never thought about that, though I will have to come up with a good name for him”
The mustache is an expansive enterprise. While we have uncovered many secrets of the whisker ways, so much remains mysterious: Where do people get those tiny, specialized mustache combs? Do they make miniature mustache hairspray? And, most importantly, do these budding mustaches whisper ancient follicular secrets at night? Perhaps they’re plotting world domination, one perfectly waxed curl at a time.
These questions, though, remained unanswered, and until you can get an answer for yourself, keep your upper lips groomed, your questions unanswered, and your suspicions…suspiciously well-trimmed.