Comb 'em if you got 'em

Last night I had the most uplifting experience a middle-age guy like myself can get (and still talk about publicly, that is).

There comes a point in every boy's life where he looks at older men and realizes "Oh, crap. Someday I may become just as bald as they are!"

Like the platypus, androgenetic alopecia (or male-pattern baldness for those of you who didn't seek out that article on Wikipedia) is proof that God has quite the sense of humor.

The problem is you have no way of knowing if the joke's on you.

It's very unnerving, really. You can spend decades hiding that inner fear. One day life is all fine and dandy, and then you see an uncle you haven't seen in a few years and suddenly you're in front of the bathroom mirror tracing your hairline with your finger to see if it's moved since the last time you checked.

My father, himself part of God's punchline, describes the part in his hair as "very wide." Growing up with him was like watching a stadium roof retract very, very, very slowly. Before I was even out of high school my brother's hair was like Mary-Kate Olsen. (And I do not mean long and blonde - that's Mary-Kate's hair. I mean his hair was no longer thin, it was emaciated.) He finally gave up combing and took up shaving.

Needless to say, it was not the most comfortable environment in which to remain vain.

So last night I got a haircut. After trimming the sides and taking down the length, without so much as asking the stylist grabbed that other set of shears - you know, the ones that cut some hairs out while leaving others in place.

It seems there was a problem with the hair atop my head. And while past performance is no guarantee of future results, it was promising, nonetheless.

My hair was too thick.