Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

Aging sucks.

I am thankful that I have a gracious family.  Recently I went to a well-known hair-cutting establishment to get a haircut.  The hair on the top of my head had grown to the point that it was bothering me . . . I felt as if I was entering into a comb over stage and definitely did not like that I was perceiving my self-image as something resembling the Rudy Giuliani hair dye scandal or (God forbid) a Donald Trump whatever it is on his head scene.  It just didn’t feel right . . . I felt top heavy.  So . . . a haircut it was. 

 

Maybe I should call it “shearing” . . . as in shearing a sheep.  In a matter of minutes, the stylist or shearer had done her thing with the clippers and scissors. What once was there was gone.  In fact, most of it was gone . . . I was mere millimeters from being completely bald shaven.  My head looked like one of those kitchen sink brushes used to wash dishes.  At least it looked that way when I finally got to see the result.

 

When it comes to haircuts. I am helpless.  Helpless because once I take off my glasses I cannot see.  I see shapes.  I see light.  But I cannot see the fine detail of what is taking place above my shoulders.  I am blind and at the mercy of whoever is holding the clipper.  And I sit there . . . motionless and listening to the whirling of the clipper’s blades mowing down my hair.  Over and over.  Whirl!  Whirl! I trust the stylist . . . and then she proclaims she is done.

 

“How does it look?” she asks.

 

Being a nice guy who blind without his glasses, I proclaim, “It feels good.”  As to how it looks . . . well, until I get my glasses on I have no clue.  Putting my glasses on, and once again being a nice guy, I say it looks good even though I really did not look at it.  I paid my bill.  Thanked the stylist and gave her a healthy tip.  Threw my hat on.  And left.  Actually, I hightailed it to the store next door, ran into the bathroom, yanked off my hat, looked in the mirror . . . and gasped in shock! Where had all my hair gone?  Who was that nearly bald person looking back in the mirror at me? 

 

Yeah, you got it . . . I was embarrassed.  And, yes, I know the old saying about the difference between a “good haircut” and a “bad haircut” is two weeks.  In that moment I didn’t want to show myself to anyone . . . thank goodness for hats . . . and gracious people.  The family members all said that it looked fine.  My wife said that she liked it.  The grandkids didn’t say a word because they really didn’t care.  One of the little ones, upon touching my stubbly head called me “Dad”.  “Dad” is in the military and keeps his stubbly short.  They were being “nice”.  I imagined that whenever they left the room they were secretly snickering at shearing—I mean, haircut.  But they were being nice.

 

Since my early twenties, haircuts have been an adventure.  Apparently, I have the sort of hair that barbers and hairstylists either find a great challenge or a disaster waiting to happen.  Whatever the case, I just know that no two haircuts I have received over the years are the same.

 

My hair has issues.

 

Since I was a child, I have been told that I have a “double crown”.  I had to look that one up. That means that there are two points on my head in which the hair grows in a circular formation.  This circular formation is called a “whorl”.  I have two whorls that seem to want to take my hair in conflicting directions, thus making it difficult to cut. It is like two hurricanes or tornados bouncing off each other vying for control while neither gains it.  This makes cutting my hair difficult.

 

I have had a receding hairline since my early twenties on top of the double crown.  Over the years the hairs on my head have been secretly sneaking off to who knows where!  Where there once was hair, there now is none.  Over the years I have gained more forehead as the hair has retreated to parts unknown.  Since it has been going on for so long, I am sort of used to it.  The only problem is that there is a stubborn clump of hair on my forehead that refused to give it up when all the rest of the hair did.  Instead, they have massed themselves as a little island in the middle of my forehead leaving a gap between them and the rest of the hair.  A teenager in a youth group once told me . . . it looks like a fob, and I should let it grow out long and dye it purple.  I never did, but it just won’t give up the ghost and hangs on for dear life.  It is a dilemma for those who cut my hair as they attempt to match it up with the rest of the remaining hair.

 

I am also balding.  It seems that the two “whorls” at the crown of head are losing participants, and the spots up there are getting bigger and balder all the time.  Where the whorls once fought for supremacy, it is now a race to nothingness.

 

All of this makes it difficult to cut my hair.  I have seen the barber and stylist cringe when they look at my head. It is a challenge.  It is an adventure.  I know it.  I have known it for years.  The only real solution, at least in my mind, is to buzz it all off.  Cut it down to the stubble.  But I have resisted.  I guess there is still some vanity left in me, but I have resisted.  I keep telling myself I ought to do it once I completely retire and I am not around people much.  It will be less of a shock to them and to me.

 

Oh well . . . the stylist took that choice away with this recent haircut.  She shaved it all off.  Swoosh!  What once was there was now gone.  I guess she decided what she thought was best and went for it . . . or maybe, considering all the obstacles with my hair, she kept cutting and cutting thinking she could make something work.  Then, suddenly, she realized that she had cut it all off!  Since I couldn’t see what she was doing, what could I say?  It felt good.

 

Several days since the scalping . . . I mean, haircut . . . I can honestly say that it really isn’t so bad.  I have never been one to look at myself in the mirror much, so it is pretty much out of sight, out of mind.  It feels good.  No one runs off screaming when I enter a room.  Children don’t point and laugh. My dogs still love me. My wife thinks it looks good and since she has to see it more than me, that is good to know.  Besides . . . in two weeks it will move from being a “bad haircut” to being a “good haircut” . . . and I have a hat.  Lots of hats.  It is amazing what a hat can do for one’s self-image.

 

In the end . . . I might just have to keep my hair cut like this.  It feels good . . . and good is good.        

Apolecia Wonderment

“Anyone can be confident with a full head of hair. But a confident bald man - there's your diamond in the rough.”

(Larry David)

“I don't care if they call me baldie or chrome dome. God took an eraser and brushed my head clean. I'd rather be bald on top than bald inside.”

(Joe Garagiola)

My three sons are fairly decent fellows . . . nice guys; but, I am pretty sure that they blame me.  Though they never complain, gripe, moan, or whine . . . I am pretty sure that the balding of their heads they blame on me.  I am pretty sure that they lament under their breath.  I am the cause of their balding . . . I have been going bald since the age of twenty-one.  As nice as they are, I see their resentment in their eyes when I take off my ball cap.

According to statistics, fifty percent of the male population enters into the balding stage at some point in their lives . . . in other words, fifty percent of the male population is going to experience baldness before they kick the bucket.  Unfortunately some of us have been dealing with the issue of apolecia a heck of a lot longer than the rest of our species.  The fact is that half of us males are going to go bald.

Now I have been dealing with the receding hair line issue . . . the going bald issue . . . for a long, long time.  I have read and heard just about everything that one could ever hear when it comes to baldness . . . blame it on the individual’s mother’s family . . . curse the hair care products that parents made us use . . . I have heard it all.  Yet, the bottom line is that men are going to get bald, and it is about time men sucked up and accepted the fact!

First of all, with fifty percent of the male population having some form of baldness . . . well, there is money to be made.  According to statistics, the hair loss industry is worth a whopping 3.5 billion dollars a year.  Primarily the money that is being made is in the hair restoration business . . . a pretty useless and worthless industry.  Yet, vanity rules . . . billions of dollars are spent in the hope that one day there will be . . . well, hair  Okay, guys, put the money back in the wallet.  Many of the scams produce nothing more than empty wallets and bank accounts.  The majority of the products being hawked are worthless.

I was told, when I started balding, that baldness comes from the mother’s side of the family.  When I looked at my mother . . . well, I never saw any balding.  If a person’s mother’s side of the family had a lot of bald men, the curse was passed on.  The truth of the matter is that none of us can blame our mothers or their families for being bald.  Odds are that those of us who are balding can blame both sides of the family.  Baldness is an equal opportunity curse . . . it doesn’t really care which side of the family it comes from . . . falling hair is music to whichever side of the family has baldness.  Hey, it is a crap shoot . .. either you keep your hair or you lose it.

Of course I am getting older.  I may have started watching the hair recede when I hit twenty-one, but at the same time I have started to age.  With aging comes gray hair . . . or in my case, white hair.  I don’t know who is winning . . . the hair falling out or the hair turning gray.  Long ago I heard that plucking out gray hairs would induce hair growth . . . three to one is what I heard.  Turns out it is not true.  In fact, plucking grey hairs only speeds up the balding process.  I never could believe this story . . . at the rate that my hair was turning gray, if I had plucked them in hopes that more hair would grow, I would have been a full-fledge chrome dome years ago.  Telly Savalas would have nothing on me . . . except having a better lollipop stash than I had.  If I had embraced this myth, I would have been completely bald years ago.

Now my father, and my sons grandfather, swore that there were several reasons that I was going bald . . . of course he was speaking as a man who had a full head of hair.  First he blamed it on the shampoo that he bought for the family to use on a daily basis . . . Head and Shoulders.  Once his sons started balding he remarked that it was that particular shampoo that caused the hair loss.  Of course Procotor and Gamble would have never admitted to such a theory . . . except that I hear they have a whole laboratory with bald mice they experimented on to test the effectiveness of their Head and Shoulders shampoo . . . they are all bald, but—by God—they do not have any dandruff.  Though there may be some truth to that understanding . . . any chemical could create the same results.

The other thing that my father liked to blame the baldness he was witnessing on his eldest son was ball caps.  Now I do not know which came first . . . baldness or the ball cap.  Because I had a receding hair line, I wore ball caps . . . still do.  When I am not working in the church or at the university, the ball cap is the key piece to my wardrobe.  And, though it is true that I have a little fop on the top of my head . . . that separates the majority of hair from the rest . . . the ball cap did not create my baldness.  Primarily it is ball caps that keep my balding head from getting sunburnt . . . which keeps me from getting flakey skin and having to use Head and Shoulders.  Ball caps have nothing to do with hair loss unless a person wears them so tight that it pulls off hair when removing. 

For years I believed my father.  I quit using Head and Shoulders years and years ago . . . and, I started wearing lots of white shirts.  Can’t find dandruff on a white shirt.  I never quit wearing baseball caps . . . they kept me from getting sunburnt on my bald spots . . . plus I have a lot of really cool baseball caps.  The bottom line is that baldness happens no matter what a person does.

BUT!  I say, “BUT!”  That does not mean that any male in his right mind wouldn’t attempt to halt the onslaught of male baldness without whatever weapons he could find.  There are as may remedies for male baldness as there are bald men . . . remember, 3.5 billion dollars a year.  There is Rogaine . . . there has been some success, but for the most part it makes what hair balding men have greasy and smelly.  There is Propecia which is a drug that promises to block hair loss.  I’d love to give it a chance, but I have passed the point of no return.  There are natural supplements . . . which are like vitamins that promise hair recovery . . . again, just a myth.

It is a fact that stress causes baldness.  Stress can come from just about anywhere . . . the environment . . . to the stuff you use to wash your hair . . . to the relationships one has in his or her life . . . to the way that one even combs one’s hair.  Since I am constantly worrying about whether or not my sons are going to blame me for their hair loss . . . I am under a lot of stress.  Working in an office with eight women . . . stress.  Attempting to juggle two jobs . . . stress.  Wondering whether or not I am the epitome of Brad Pitt . . . stress.  Stress causes hair loss . . . whether I am pulling my hair out or it is dropping out . . . stress in a major factor in losing hair.

Sooooooooooooooooooooooooo . . . you can either accept it or fight it.  I am cheap.  Because I am cheap, I choose not to fight my receding hair line.  I refuse to spend money to retard the loss of hair . . . to possibly kick start new hair growth . . . or to plug in hair rows to create an illusion of hair.  Let the hair fall!  Darn if I am going to let my hair dictate the way I live life. 

Someone once said that God made only so many perfect heads . . . on the rest God put hair.  I count myself among the blessed as I near the state of perfection.  I appreciate the graciousness of my three sons . . . and, I apologize for whatever crisis I have a part in when it comes to their own baldness.  I am sure, if they take the time to actually research the topic, they will come to understand . . . understand that good ol’ Dad—in all of his glorious baldness—had nothing to do with their baldness.  It was a crap shoot . . . or as Doris Day used to sing, “Que sera, sera.”

In the end it really does not matter whether or not I am bald.  What matters is what is on the inside.  I am a diamond in the rough . . . It is what is under the hood that counts.  I am a worthy adversary of Brad Pitt underneath . . . just don’t let me blind you when the light hits my chrome dome!

Superman Got Old

I think it is “official” . . . I’m old.

The wife and I just got done watching our eleven month old granddaughter for a couple of nights, and we are both worn out.  Now I understand why God blesses the young with children and not us in the AARP crowd . . . it takes two twenty-some year olds to keep up with an eleven month old!  The wife and I are tired . . . and, apparently old.

Once again, I stumbled upon a list of the “top ten signs that you are getting old” on the Internet . . . I scored high on the list of signs . . . like in the top 80 percentile.  I thought to myself . . . that sucks! 

Here is the list:

--Thinning hair . . . yep, gone are the days that I have to move the hair out of my eyes.  Been losing it since high school . . . oh well, thank goodness I also had the next “sign"! 
--Weakening eye sight . . . up to trifocals and waiting patiently while they develop quad-focals.  But the nice thing about it is, is that the fact that I can’t see all the hair that I am losing up top.  As everyone knows . . . God only made so many perfect heads, on the rest God put hair.  My perfect is breaking through! 
--When God slams a door, God usually leaves a window open somewhere . . . same with hair.  What God takes away, God usually places it somewhere else on the body.  Another “sign” of getting older is excessive nose and ear hair (probably back hair, too).  Yeah, I hit that “sign”, too.  It is a shame when the hair stylist adds an extra dollar to the bill to trim the ears and nose . . . actually, she might be cutting more hair there than on top! 
--Another “sign” is sensitivity to room temperatures . . . in other words, I am either too hot or cold . . . nothing is ever just right.  I thought for a long time that it was empathic menopause to show support for the wife going through life changes, but the doctor assured me it was just me getting older.  Thank God, most Montanans dress in layers . . . I can start the day in a sweat shirt and end it in a t-shirt . . . sometimes I remember my pants! 
--Which brings us to memory loss . . . I think.  At least that is what I think it said . . . I could be wrong, but when you get to the end of this, you will notice that there are only nine “signs” listed . . . that is because I can’t remember what the tenth one was.  But, hey!  Each day is a new adventure when you can’t remember. . . makes for an exciting new day each and every day. 
--Two of the “signs” I decided had nothing to do with me . . . at least not yet.  One is that nails become yellow and more brittle.  I only have half of that problem . . . and, no, it is not my nails yellowing!  I do notice that they are more brittle than they used to be, but they aren’t yellow yet!  The other “sign” is skin losing its elasticity . . . meaning that I have loose skin hanging around . . . not quite happening yet. 
-- I haven’t even had a chance for my skin to get loose . . . because the next sign, increasing fat deposits, has filled in those places where the skin should have gotten lose . . . primarily around the gut.  I don’t know if it is age or beer . . . probably the two of them are teaming up against me.  At the same time, it beats lose skin hanging off my body! 
--Then, the last one . . . shrinking.  Apparently as we get older our bodies shrink . . . except in those places where we are experiencing increasing fat deposits.  I was seven foot tall in my twenties, now I am five foot ten . . . at least I think I was . . . damn, I can’t remember!
 

Reality sucks . . . especially when that reality deals with me.  It was bad enough that the tiredness that set in after the granddaughter went home with Mom and Dad was due to age; but, I sure did not need to be reminded of it from some Internet list.  My youthfulness is slowly . . . heck it is sinking fast . . . and, I am getting older.  The invincible super hero I once was . . . Superman . . . is getting old.  I look into the closet, see my super hero outfit, and long for those days when I could outlast my children . . . now, the granddaughter and I take naps together in the afternoon!

And, that is okay.  I’d take my youth any day for a nap with my granddaughter.  We all get old . . . including Superman . . . at least I think that is what is supposed to happen . . . I can’t remember!