Confessions of a Bald Man

What should be a balding man’s worst nightmare? The comb-over.  Nothing struck fear in me more than that dreaded phrase.  Comb-over is even in the dictionary;

combover |ˈkōmˌōvər| (also comb-over)
noun
hair that is combed over a bald spot in an attempt to cover it.

The other night I had a nightmare about a comb-over.  (Yeah these are the types of nightmares I have..last night I had a dream about batting in a little league game, and threatening the pitcher for throwing at me…in little league…)  My dream consisted of me looking at myself from behind, and watching me trying to comb-over hair.  Not pleasant.

So I knew ye old hair was going for a long time, and I had come to accept that.  Eventually less and less hair was at my disposal to use.  Then the inevitable happened, and I knew.  I fired up the car and took a drive to Wal-Mart, bought an $8 pair of clippers and shaved it all off.

Outside of feeling more aerodynamic at the time, there were some other pros for having a shaved head:

1.  I’m going to save a ton on shampoo.

2. I’m going to save a ton on hair gel.

3.  Women are going to rub my head.  Lots of them.

Number three did not occur as much as I had hoped, but that was a pro at the time.  For a few years I’m feeling pretty good about my new found “do”.  Occasionally mom would say something like “Wow I wish you had your old hair back” or “Why don’t you try some Rogaine?” I guess there is something about spraying a chemical on my head to grow hair that frightens me.

Figure 1 – Comb-over examples

Then year before last the whole bald thing hit me.

I was up with Dave  & Susie in the Wisconsin Dells taking some kind of horse drawn carriage ride, with this Mom, Dad & little girl behind us.  The tour was going right along and then I hear the little girl say, “Wow Mommie…THAT GUY IS BALD!”  I was looking around to make fun of the bald guy too.  This was gonna be awesome!  “HEY CUEBALL!”  I turned around and saw she was looking at me.

Oh crap.

My first reaction was to say something off the wall like, “That’s what chemo does to you…”, but I’m pretty sure I would have caught on fire right there for that one.  Instead I just laughed and smiled.  What else can you do?  It was a little kid.

There is a point to this.  Guys – if you are staring to go..accept it.  The quicker you do, the quicker you can endure the humiliation.

-Kev

P.S.

Don’t think I didn’t imagine pushing her off the cart.