by Jerrod Clark

Created on: December 09, 2008

Looking up at the television monitor of a local convenicen store, I couldn't help but smile to myself at the poor guy who's head looked like a dome light. A full head of dark hair incircled a small patch of nothing at the crown of his head. It might as well have been a halo surrounding him. The black and white images shifted to another camera and then I realized I was the guy with the dome light shining brightly.

I have never been one for hats, I have never been one for hair, but like like Cindella says, "You don't know what you got till its gone." At first I was crushed. I realized it was too late to go out and buy a hair piece of some sort. Now I am not opposed to these devices and I am sure they serve some sort of purpose but wearing a dead squirrel on my head was never really a thought. The next thing which crossed my mind was medication. I quickly ruled this out as my natural fear and freaky side effects took hold. I could see myself walking into my place of employement the next week with hands which resembeling a Yeti, a bald head would have been the least of my worries.

The most troubling aspect of going bald was that no one had bothered to mention the fact that I was going bald. If I see one of my buddies walking aournd with his fly open, I tell him. If I see a buddy with a piece of lunch in his teeth, I tell him. I guess that no one told me because it's not like I could close up shop so to speak or brush my teeth and get rid of the offending piece of spice. The simple fact was that I am going bald and I seem to be the only one who cared.

Most of my friends are bald by choice. I looked aroud at the guys who I hang around with and realize the majority are bald by the stroke of a razor. Sure one of my buddies took a chunk out of the top of his head one time when he rushed the process. I decided that I was not going to rush eveloution by taking this route. Besides, I am not a big fan of shaving and this just seems like too much effort for what what my body was doing naturally.

The first time someone pointed out my baldness in public, I was suprised that I was not mortified but instead amused that someone would take the time to comment on my hair style or the lack there of. The person inquired about my lack of hair as if I had made a conscious decision to reduce the hair count on my head. My natural tendancy towards scarsasim got the better of me and I replied that I was loosing my hair because I was thinking too hard and I had burned it off with the powers of my mind. The conversation went then deteroirated much like my hair line into jokes about the satelite system NASA was planning to launch to study the surface of my skull and possibly build a way station on their next stop to Mars.

Accepting the fact that I am a bald man, slightly overweight, and a weakness for beer and buffalo wings gave me a sense of peace I have never expeienced before. I understand I am who I am and hair or the lack thereof does not define me. So what if I am now more aerodynamic, I just chalk it up to elimitating my carbon foot print by reduceing drag when I stick my head out the car widow. When I was growing up it was a mortal fear of mine that I might go bald. Now that I have stared my fear in the face of the television monitor, life is really not all that bad at all.

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