In celebration of the 7th anniversary of the Bearded Odyssey, I am re-running the series throughout the summer. This chapter was originally published in The Daily Nebraskan on July 6, 2003.

A wise man named Aaron Shigley once told me, “The monuments and lakes and rivers — and everything else you think would be the focus of your learning — end up taking a backseat to the people you meet and the stories they have to tell.”

There’s a woman, sort of, named Rachel who works at a gas station in Pacific Beach. With all due respect, Rachel is a man doing a bad job at being a woman. He has long, stringy blonde hair and very bad makeup, consisting of a thick layer of pinkish foundation.

Every time I see him/her, he is wearing a similar, if not identical, long-sleeved button-up shirt with a knee-length skirt. To make it all the more awkward, he still has the body and the voice of a man.

Some people can pull off the transvestite thing quite convincingly; Rachel is the polar opposite.
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In celebration of the 7th anniversary of the Bearded Odyssey, I am re-running the series throughout the summer. This chapter was originally published in The Daily Nebraskan on June 22, 2003.

I’d been walking along the coast of Pacific Beach in San Diego when it was time to go meet my friends at The Tavern. I started up the hill to head down Garnet Avenue when a fluffy-bearded man in a leather jacket muttered something to me from the shadows.

He started on an intimidating combination of scripture and marijuana-induced rambling, burning his fingers trying to light his quarter-inch joint, before formally introducing himself: “Behold, the hand of God! I am Gonzo Yhvh, ben Olam Haba Ebets Yhvh, the archangel of God.”

This was Gonzo — a balding, red-bearded man of probably about 50, although the elements undoubtedly added a few unfair lines to his face. He gave me a brief history of his previous lives on Earth, and how he was reborn into this life in Phoenix, Ariz., (“Get it?” he asked. “I was reborn in Phoenix!” He told me God has a sense of humor that way.) and had just moved to San Diego.

I politely listened to what he had to say, but I explained people were waiting for me at the bar, so I needed to get going. I told him that I’d come find him later.

Now, when I said later, I meant when I someday returned to San Diego, but he called out that when I saw him later, he would come sliding across the floor. “I have my own special door in the back — you’ll see it,” he said. At this point, I figured he was just speaking nonsense about having some door at the bar. But he continued:

“At the bottom of the door is a self-illuminated crystal. Above that is dark red garnet. You walk in the door and everything lights up. You’ll know it’s my door because there’s an eight-sided fountain outside with nothing in it. I asked God if I could put a statue of me in it. You know what he said to me?”

I didn’t, so Gonzo got right in my face for his God impersonation: “Don’t even think about it!” He laughed and took a seat back on the bench.

“Maybe I could put some fish in it. You know…I don’t know if we even have fish in Heaven.” Then he remembered he was talking to me. “So yeah, when you get to Heaven, look me up.”

This was a little too cool to walk away from, so I asked him if he’s always been called Gonzo. My guess was that he had a “normal” name, like Brian or Tom or Chester. Sure enough, he used to have a different name: Onzo.

After explaining the alphanumeric significance of the name Onzo and its relation to Jesus, he told me that the change to Gonzo had less to do with the numerology than it did with his new arch-angelic role: “I was just Onzo,” he said, “but then everything changed. They changed the job description on me.”
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In celebration of the 7th anniversary of the Bearded Odyssey, I am re-running the series throughout the summer. This chapter was originally published in The Daily Nebraskan on June 15, 2003.

Just a kid without a beard.

Obermeyer family lore has it that Buffalo Bill Cody’s favorite niece married into my Grandma’s family long ago. My own travel lore has it that, since I was in Huntington Beach on Memorial Day, I didn’t have an opportunity to visit any departed relatives.

Driving out of Denver on I-70, I saw an exit that said “Buffalo Bill’s Grave.” So here was a chance to make up for the missed holiday and visit an honorary Obermeyer.

There had been signs for the Mother Cabrini shrine grouped with the signs for Buffalo Bill’s Grave, and I was only seeing signs for Mother Cabrini, so I kept going with those. I took a horrible winding road up the side of a mountain and cursed Buffalo Bill for getting buried in such a hard-to-reach place — I fear winding roads, particularly those that cling to sides of mountains.

Off in the distance …
it’s a giant white statue.

I finally arrived at a nun convent on the top of a mountain far above Denver. There was a little chapel at the base of the peak where, in the early 1900s, Mother Cabrini supposedly struck a stone with her cane and water sprung forth that still flows to this day. Up on the peak was a big white statue of what I presumed to be Mother Cabrini. Thinking maybe there was a cemetery up there where Buffalo Bill was buried, I started up the steps.

Now it did occur to me that it would be rather strange that this army scout-turned-showman would be buried at a convent, but here I was, so up I’d go.

It was a creepy walk up, to say the least. Beyond the monuments and decorations along the trail, there were also a lot of signs saying “Beware of dangerous snakes.” To prove my fearlessness (please note sarcasm), I took a picture of one of the signs. I did see one crude, handmade sign that said “Beware of the snake,” so I took a picture of that too.
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In celebration of the 7th anniversary of the Bearded Odyssey, I am re-running the series throughout the summer. This chapter was originally published in The Daily Nebraskan on June 8, 2003.

There comes a time in a man’s life when he must stop fighting nature and accept his destiny.

There comes a time in a man’s life when he must accept the master plan of those little things that grow out of his face.

There comes a time in a man’s life when he must grow a beard.

I’ve never had a beard, and to be honest, I’m not sure I ever will, at least as far as true beard aficionados define them. I’m not the most facial-folliculated person. In fact, I’m probably one of the least facial-folliculated people I know.

Mine is not one of those peach-fuzz babyface problems – more a case of some severely dry patches in the field.

My dad has a great beard. He’s had a beard as long as I’ve known him. My grandpa never had a beard to my knowledge, but he had some great chops for a while. My dad took over farming from my grandpa, and took those chops and turned them into a great beard.

He’s been thinking about retiring from farming and wanting to lose the beard lately. I consider it my role and my destiny to take over in his footsteps; I will let my beard grow, and one day I will have a yard in which I may proudly mow perfect diagonals.

A lot of great men beyond my dad have had beards. Abraham Lincoln. Jesus. Moses. Other Biblical characters. Randy Savage. Jamie from the Real World/Road Rules Battle of the Sexes.

Will I be remembered as a great bearded man? Probably not. Most likely, my beard will look like I slept in some hair clippings after accidentally splattering a few random patches of glue on my face. But it’s not really about how beautiful and/or manly my beard is; it’s about the quest.

While some may grow a beard out of some statement of manhood or to hide nasty facial scars, my beard will be part of a much bigger process.

You see, the beard is a way of separating oneself from the world. The most unique, personalized thing any of us have is our face, and growing the beard is like nature’s way of taking that away from everyone else. It’s pulling your hairy hankie over your mouth before you rob a bank, like bandits did in the Old West.

It is that withdrawal from society then that motivates me to use my beard to jump in — to take this newfound anonymity as an opportunity to head out on some truth-finding adventures.

I will road-trip to the four corners of the United States and places in between, such as Idaho, seeking adventures of danger and enlightenment wherever I may find them and wherever they may find me. All the while, as my experience grows, so shall my beard.

We will grow together, in fact — the reader, the author and the facial hair.

When I tell people my plan for the summer, the typical response is “Oh, you’re following Kerouac’s footsteps?” or they try to relate this to some other beat-poet yippie-doo.

No. I just want to drive around the country, get in adventures and grow a beard. Any connection to anything hippie-related is an unfortunate coincidence.

Weekly(?) updates in the Summer Daily Nebraskan will keep you posted as to where I am, what’s happening to me, and how the beard is doing. I have a natural tendency to meet strange people and get into strange situations; hopefully these will outweigh any bearded deficiencies.

Join me, my friends, as we embark on The Bearded Odyssey.