Balding-The Horror

Balding



I was 28 when I came to the realization that my hairline had really receded. I’d lived for several years through denial. “It’s just a widow’s peak” I would tell myself, or “it’s just my natural hairline,” which was partially true, just not the truth that I wanted. As I stared into the mirror that evening I had one of those reflective moments where you’re made quite aware of your mortality and long for a past when things seemed less uncertain.

I tend to regret the past. Even when the memory is a joyful recollection, the end emotion is always some kind of chest gripping regret-like feeling reminding me that I won’t ever be able to relive that blissful experience. As I peered into that unforgiving piece of glass I thought about how my future wife won’t ever be able to run her hand through my soft brown locks, or how I was never going to enjoy the youthful sensation of hair blowing in the wind.

After keeping my head shaved with clippers through my college years, I had gone back and forth with attempts to grow my hair out, then cutting it short again (although not as short as I had in college). I had been on a “let it grow” phase for around 6 months or so. Growing out usually consisted of me pushing my hair forward in a napoleon like hairstyle and creatively placing it over the two receding spots on either side of my bangs (or what’s left of them). On top of all this my hair is wavy and very thin, so the grow out phase usually revealed the schizophrenic nature of my hair follicles, as my mane would begin to “fro” out in all sorts of crazy directions punctuated by “mullet-like” curls in the back. I was preparing for a mission trip to central America, so in order to be of maximum comfort, I decided it was time to break out the clippers again.

Elderly men still have hair. A good number of them still have it up until the day they die. My grandfather, God rest his soul, died at 73 with a full on bushy head, my uncle still has a vigorous head of hair into his mid 50’s, even my father as he approaches 60, enjoys a relatively healthy portion of cranial coverage. I wish I would have paid attention in biology class when we calculated through our family lineage the probability of baldness, but I was 10 foot tall and bulletproof at the time and it was of no concern to me. There was no way I would ever be bald, that was exclusive only to old white males who stressed themselves out over payments on multiple garage homes and/or management jobs trying to keep people like me in line.

For some reason I always looked at the American white male as the most boring creation God has ever made. To me “they” listen only to bland music, watch cars drive around in circles at several hundred miles per hour every Sun. while consuming brand name domestic alcohol, and to escape reality, they spend afternoons whacking small dimpled spheres up and down fields of manicured grass. Basically any hobby or activity engaged in by the American Caucasoid was, in my view, pitifully un-cool. I submerged myself in anything and everything I could to avoid the ever present fact that I was somehow linked to this miserable race of humans. I can jump, cleared almost 7’0” as a high jumper in high school. I learned to move parts of my body in rhythm with hip hop/dance music and I even followed my lifelong dream of becoming a rapper in a hip hop group (seriously). I hung out and partied with only artsy-fartsy/trendy people and only when becoming engrossed in the fall ritual of college football would my true nature start to be revealed. Starting to learn who or what you really are or are supposed to be can be such an excruciating reality check.

I’m still with my group and we enjoye local success and popularity with people from a lot of different walks of life. I can still dance and I’m still a good athlete, but the lack of hair on my head and the paradox of who I am and who my family is have finally caught up with me. When I finally became willing to let God show me who I really am something weird has started to happen, I am like the most obvious white dude you will ever meet. I am a trustee at my church, I sing in the choir, I work at a political advertising job; I talk like a completely boring dork using only big words to feign a high intellectual capacity. I’ve started to notice hair growing not only on my head, but in other strange places and I’ve begun to picture my future as a home owning, lawn tending, overweight, hairy chest vanilla gorilla.

Instead of trying to escape this awful reality, there’s a voice inside my head that says “guess what you’re okay!” What? What do you mean? “Right now in this moment, you are okay!” “You have infinitely more blessings than you need!” “Plus I am in control you stupid white boy!” God is always right many times much to my disdain. So instead of working on my dunk shot or trying to do freestyle raps like Eminem in the mirror I run my hand over the stubble of my head, sigh deeply, smile and lay my vanilla ice cream cone cranium on my pillow of infinite blessings and give thanks to God, who still loves me despite being the goofiest white boy I know.