The medicine cabinet was crusty and rusty, much like me. And like me, it’s old enough to be a museum piece.

The cabinet was installed in my parents’ bathroom when it was added onto their farmhouse more than 60 years ago. I was just a tyke at the time, and flushing the toilet was infinitely more interesting than a smallish cabinet that sported a mirrored door. Besides, we had another mirror in the house, so I already knew what I looked like.

It was clear that the old medicine cabinet needed to be replaced or refurbished. Replacing it would cost money and I had a can of white spray paint on hand. Being a thrifty person (that sounds better than “cheapskate”), I opted for refurbishment.

The cabinet first had to be cleared of all the unguents and ointments that it had housed for many years. Being a thrifty person, I checked the contents of the assorted items before tossing them. Even though they might have been OK, I decided against jeopardizing my skin with those ancient and mysterious chemical concoctions.

Hidden behind a jar of facial cream was an old-fashioned safety razor. I instantly recognized it as Dad’s, and an unpleasant memory bobbed to the surface.

I began to sprout facial fur at about age 14, but the whiskers didn’t come in all at once. My patchy beard made it look as though I had a serious case of mange.

I needed to stand close to a razor, so I borrowed the only one in the house, namely, Dad’s. The results of my initial encounter with sharpened steel was physically and visually painful. It looked as if my face had endured a close encounter with a woodchipper.

My parents soon gave me an electric razor. It was small and primitive, but it didn’t make my face appear as though I had attempted to shave with a rusty machete.

I understand that many ladies had similar and considerably more painful experiences when they first tried to shave their legs. Legs have numerous square inches of skin for a ravenous razor to slice and dice. If I were charged with that task, I would say “the heck with it,” even if wearing shorts in public involved being mistaken for a bear.

The safety razor is much less dangerous than its predecessor, the straight edge razor. I would freak if I were forced to shave with a straight razor, known colloquially as the cut-throat. No matter how hard I would try to avoid it, I’d always be thinking about Sweeny Todd.

I’ve had a few close shaves with a straight razor, but they’ve all been at the hands of a professional barber.

At the conclusion of a haircut, a good barber will use a straight razor to clean up the hairline at the back of the neck. It’s always a pleasant and soothing surprise when the hot lather is slathered onto the skin. I can see why a guy might like to pamper himself with a daily shave administered by a skilled tonsorial artist.

I quit shaving shortly after graduating from high school. Not only did this lend me a rugged frontiersman-like façade, but it also liberated me from the time-consuming chore of daily facial lawncare.

But alas. Letting the beard grow doesn’t mean complete freedom from sharpened steel. My beard follicles seem eager to colonize my entire face. This means that I must groom the half-moons below my eyes, or I’ll soon begin to resemble the Wolfman.

Plastic disposable razors are cheap and light and get the job done. But you get what you pay for.

Just for fun, I slipped a new double-edged blade into Dad’s old razor. I picked it up and felt its heft and inherent danger. This is no weenie piece of plastic; it’s a seriously terrifying and manly chunk of metal.

Having gone that far, I carefully placed the razor against my soaped-up cheek. Flashbacks of a lacerated mug dotted with crimson slivers of toilet paper flooded my brain.

But the blade didn’t leave any damage in its wake. The shaved skin was as smooth as the proverbial baby’s bottom.

I wonder how things 0might have turned out if I’d experienced a similar shaving success all those decades ago. I might have never become acquainted with my wife, who thought that I resembled a certain mountain man when she first saw me.

We’ll never know what may have happened if I hadn’t looked vaguely similar to Jeremiah Johnson. And so, I have Dad’s old razor to thank for the life-changing blessing of meeting the young lady who agreed to marry me, even though I very clearly was not a bewhiskered Robert Redford.

— Jerry’s book, “Dear County Agent Guy,” can be found at www.workman.com and in bookstores nationwide.