I have no eyebrows. No eyelashes either, the hair on top of my head does frizzle in like peach fuzz sometimes but then I immediately buzz it off. What’s the point? I don’t know what happened but I woke up one fine morning and my hairs had vanished. This includes the hair on my arms, legs, underarms, the tops of my fingers and the tops of my toes. At first it blew my mind. I mean what the fuck did I do? I scanned the cramped files in my mind only to come up with a huge fat zero. It was disturbing and on top of that, there was no top of that. Bald. Quite devastating and bald. The hair on my head had been a source of pride. A biblical story all its own. In a few days time the realization that I no longer needed to purchase a shampoo just made me crazy. I stopped taking showers. What was the point? With no hair to keep clean at any place on my body, I knew I would feel ridiculous stepping into the tub to shower. Even my pubes had taken flight to some distant shore I would never explore.

This amazing loss was turning my life inside out. Think of it. I no longer had to shave, buy razors, shaving cream or after shave. Products that up until this very day had garnered a special place on my shopping list. Especially the after shave. I went for the green bottle of Mennen that my father used to use.The epitome of a masculine scent. Then when tired of that I went for the English Leather because there was a guy in my dorm at college who used that and I thought it was the sexiest fragrance I had ever been privileged to have waft up my sensitive nose. I had to think if it was able to put me in the mood, the ladies would no doubt also find it simply irresistible. But how in the world might they find me irresistible with a bald head, no matter what scent I designed to pour on my face.

I began to feel like George on Seinfeld. He was totally insecure about getting the girl because most of the hair on top of his noggin had also split for the opposite coast. I began to ply on the after shave in spite of my hairless face. I was desperate to acquire some crumb of normalcy in my life. My self-esteem had all been washed down the drain and I hadn’t even had to shave it off. I knew I had turned some kind of corner and was at least psychologically turning into an entirely different type of man. A hairless man. My masculinity had vanished like smoke. Not to say that I felt closer to being feminine, no, my gender was dancing by itself. No partner. I mean my lack of gender was dancing. I don’t know why. And “dancing” is probably wrong. More like standing alone in the darkest corner of a high school gym ignored by all.

Now I wear a hat everywhere I go. Sometimes a fedora, sometimes a ball cap, I even wore it backwards one time, but instead of cool, looked ridiculous. Fortunately, I never did want to grow a beard or cultivate any amount of facial hair, so I quickly learned to ignore the shaving process, except of course, for the after shave. The only joy of the after shave came from my own olfactory senses and memory, it never did send the ladies running to me, even though I switched back to the Mennen. I knew I was only kidding myself that such a simple scent might actually have the power to cast a net over an unsuspecting “victim,” but I nevertheless continued to throw my line into the drink whenever I felt lucky or when I relegated my hairless thoughts into that dim corner of the gym.