The Bald And The Brave

I’m bald and, although not exactly proud of it, have come to appreciate the positive subtleties thus provided by its uninvited arrival, none of which I will trouble you with at the moment. However, I will relate that my wife recently informed me that if I were to die she would probably marry another bald man, which is cool, except for the very fact that she’s actually been thinking about it. What’s more, she says I have a good head for it, it being bald, that I have not a pointed crown nor a regrettable scar, no odd ridges here or there, and that I ought to be thankful.

While I’m at it, I should note that I’m also thankful that I still have all twenty nails on toes and fingers, that my penis is still attached and receiving adequate blood flow and that a meteor didn’t come slashing out of the heavens last night scrambling my bald head like some speckled egg.

When I started losing my hair, and I can admit it freely now, sure, it bothered me. In fact, to ease the burden and pressure I wrote a poem about it, one that always brought smiles to those who listened, primarily the follically-aloof and bushy-headed. Off the top of my head (an unfortunate pun?) I can't seem to recall the entire thing, but I will never forget the climatic ending.

Here it is:

“Think I’m Goin’ Bald” (condensed to highly climatic ending)

...The fall-out continued but I tempered my mind,
When I’m an old codger not a gray hair shall you find.
The benefits are few but tend to appease,
The wind is no problem and washin’ it’s a breeze.
But all is not lost the dilemma is finally solved,
I’m not really losin’ it I’m just highly evolved.


Yep, clever don’t you think, but what else would you expect from a bald man?

One time a little kid on the street stopped and looked up at me and asked quite innocently, “hey… what happened to all your hair?” His mother stepped up and grabbed him by the tiny shoulders, offered a forced smile and some under-the-breath apology that didn’t quite register, and shuffled him on down the street in a huff. I was dumbfounded of course and didn’t say a word. But I didn’t smile either. You want to talk about the sheltered children of America? Well, they’re all still waiting on the damn tooth fairy but to them I’m a freak, and in my mind I pictured his stupid hairy neanderthal father and walked away with a satisfied grin below my unencumbered forehead.

Poor kid.

You might have noticed that I titled this little story, this essay, confession, whatever the hell you want to call it, The Bald And The Brave, which is only about half right. I’m really not that brave at all, except that it takes some courage to go out into public these days, what with the obsession on beauty and all that crazy hair, the legions of ashamed and desperate men signing up for the International Hair Club, the toupee of the month subscription from Hairy David, and if all else fails, spray this black shit all over your noggin and walk fast.

So yes, I still go out. I’m not that big of a chicken shit. Let me go fetch my hat and I’ll prove it to you.

The Darkest Day Of My Life

It began as a nice April morning and I remember performing a yoga routine and feeling good. I had just started doing yoga a few weeks earlier and in a small yet comforting way it was giving me a sense of peace. It felt good to be more limber and to feel more calm. Things were looking up.

I was taking a shower when it happened. Amazingly, with the water running and being a good twenty miles away the rumble still reached my ears. Something abnormal had clearly just happened. Some sort of strange sonic boom or maybe even a plane crash.

I don't recall exactly what I was thinking inbetween that moment and when I finally turned on the television. Did I rush through my shower or did I remain calm, perhaps believing that my ears had somehow deceived me, and continue with the normal routine? All I remember now is that I turned on that television as soon as I got out of the shower and a news helicopter was already hovering over the Alfred T. Murrah building, black smoke twisting into the air, and the first speculation I heard from the reporter was that a gas line must have exploded.

Within a minute the enormity of what happened had already sunk in. I knew, we ALL knew, that many lives had been instantly lost. Fifteen minutes later I was driving to my office down the Broadway Extension, heading south out of Edmond toward downtown Oklahoma City, listening to radio reports as I watched that cloud of smoke drifting away to the west. Suddenly a pick-up truck rushed past me, hellbent and well over 100 mph, and I could only speculate that the driver had a loved one down there. Of course, anybody that knew someone working down there was scared to death. At that point no one could know for sure which exact buildings had been involved so there is a chance that his loved one survived. I will never know.

The rest of that morning I watched news reports and it became obvious that there had been some kind of exterior explosion, possibly a bomb, and then reports surfaced that another bomb was about to go off. The cameras showed all kinds of people fleeing in panic, women with their dirty purses and their hair all messed up, wild-eyed policemen, reporters who decided that they didn't necessarily need to become a part of the story. But when that scare subsided soon thereafter the stories of the survivors began to surface, how the lucky had escaped, about the search and rescue that was being valiantly conducted, and then came the news of the day care center.

The children.

I picked up my dad for lunch that day. He knew nothing of the explosion and hadn't heard anything despite being located only a few miles north of the site but that's another story. We didn't eat anything. Instead, we drove towards the Murrah building and got as close as we could, maybe ten blocks away. From what really amounts to just a bump in the road we had a clear view of the north side and it looked like a monster had just taken a huge bite out of it. Tatters on the edge were still blowing in the wind. You could only look for a minute or so and then you felt a twinge of shame, understanding that there were dead bodies underneath all that debris. Maybe someone still alive and struggling to breathe. Right now. Only ten blocks away. We drove away slowly, helplessly, a vile sickness spreading deep inside our guts, and how can you really ever drive away from something like that? I went home around 3 pm and continued watching reports with Lou Ann, Nicholas and Benjamin. You thanked God for that. Your family safe. Simple yet so damn essential. The sky was darkening and threatening to rain. The gloom congregated above us, through the television, through our radios. On our faces, in our sad eyes that could not look away. Despair.

Nick had a baseball practice scheduled for later that afternoon. Seeking some kind of respite I took him. We played catch for about ten minutes and then it started to rain. No one else showed up and we went home. We had made an attempt at the comfort of routine but failed. That's okay... there would be other days for blue skies and baseball.

Despair. Nicholas had a two schoolmates who lost fathers that morning. A teacher who lost her brother. Gloom. More rain. This is real and tomorrow morning it will still be real.

Made him love death. Saw what that did to him. A bitter soldier with no war to fight... so he created one. Really, in the end, just a foolish coward. Loser. Maybe there is a place in this life for suicide?

We humans are always trying to find ways to turn the tide, flip it, make something bad into something good. It's part of our survival instinct. To feel the pain of hate if we must and then try to understand it's source and create a flag of hope from any of it that appears salvageable. So I thought about writing some songs about the bombing of the Alfred T. Murrah building and did so, about 6 or 7, most of them complete with the music stamped inside my head. Not very good I'll admit but the process helped me feel better. After ten years it's all still there.

And I do mean all of it.

Below I offer one verse from my own personal healing tonic... my very own little flag of hope.

Angels' descension

Unseen by the eyes of man,

Man's pretension

To believe that he can understand.

A decade later, the horror of 9-11 included, and I guess I still don't understand. But I believe that's okay... for now.

July July & A New Admitted Guilty Pleasure

I just finished reading Tim O'Brien's July July, a short novel revolving around the 30 year reunion of old friends at a small Minnesota college. As usual the story includes strong references to Vietnam as one young man went off to war, the other to Winnipeg, but that's just a small part of it. I enjoyed it as I suspect I will enjoy anything O'Brien writes... just something about his Minnesota roots and his affinity for baseball caps I guess. And it blows me away to think that as I played with my plastic army men on the sandy beach of Lake le Homme Dieu in the late 60s that not that far away a young Tim O'Brien was struggling with his very own decision. He decided to go to war, not out of courage but out of fear of not going, survived, and we're all fortunate that he did. Quite frankly high schools ought to make room for his The Things They Carried as required reading but I'm sure that would meet with some kind of kooky right-wing objection.

And I have to admit something right here and now... I'm in love with Karen Carpenter's voice. Funny, she considered herself a drummer but I'm thinking she had the most distinctive female vocal chords of the last 25 years or so. It can melt cold butter and maybe even the cholesterol in my veins. Of course I was far too cool to dig the Carpenters back in the 70s but if you live long enough you have the opportunity to reconsider a few things. Listening now with old tinnitus-y ears and a new perspective the sad tragedy of her death hits home and kindles a fresh appreciation.

Willie & The Fire In Beulah

I recently read Rilla Askew's wonderful historical novel "Fire In Beulah" which recounts a tragic event in the history of my home state (if not the nation... if not the world... if not the...), the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. A very creative work that captures that oil boom opulence period distinctly and you really wind up caring about the characters, both black and white.

A minor character in her story is a young black boy named Willie. He was about ten at the time of the riot so that would put him in his mid sixties during the 1970s. I have an idea to write a short story about Willie as an old man living in Enid during the mid 70s, a story concerning his surviving the event and the emotional scars that he carried the rest of his life.

April Fool's Day

Well, I actually created a blog on December 31st, 2004, and subsequently destroyed it sometime in February. New Year's Eve was (is) a damn good time to start one but maybe April Fool's Day will be a more fitting beginning?

Looking back on it, I now realize that I had written quite a few nice little posts attempting insight, a couple of funny vignettes (one concerning the recent rehab of George Carlin), one recount of a near catastrophe that devolved into snivelling sentimentality, and one or two items that bordered on smug self-gratification that apparantly motivated me, on sober reflection, to delete it ALL into the netherworld along with my cure for cancer and the answer as to why we are all here.

But a few weeks ago I yearned to revisit my blog. So here I go again, with no true purpose or outline, other than to record some of my ideas for future consideration. And deletion?

I'll try to curb the smuggery this time.