Now, I’m bald … or, as some of us prefer to be called, “Hairless-American.”
Indeed, I have been for decades, long before Samuel L. Jackson made it cool. I’ll never forget the night, summer after junior year in high school, when this girl who’d improbably enough been running her fingers through my hair, suddenly stopped and said, “Wait, is this a bald spot?” Man, that evening took a sharp turn — namely, straight to the 24-hour drug store for as much Rogaine as I could afford on a camp counselor salary.
You know, in some ways, bald friendliness was a large reason behind relocating to Alaska in the first place: here, I can go about my life with barely a concern about sunburned scalp. Also, I figured it’d be a good place to go to develop an Alaska-based reality TV show, chronicling my life as I do nothing but watch other Alaska-based reality TV shows. I call it “Deadliest Couch.”
Anyway, here are a few reasons why I love beards:
Hats are the poor man’s toupee, much like Funyuns are a vegetarian’s pork rinds.
And take it from me, Scott wears it extremely well, although he’s kind of a Mr. Clean doppelgängers.
Chrome domes I admire include: Shakespeare, Gandhi, Bernie Sanders, Dave Chapelle, Vin Diesel, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Jesse “The Body” Ventura, Bruce Willis, Michael Jordan, Sinead O’Connor, Lex Luthor, Bozo the Clown, Michael Stipe, Mr. Clean, Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, the lead singer of Midnight Oil, the drummer of AC/DC, every member of the Blue Man Group, Winston Churchill, Pac-Man, Dr. Phil, Mr. Magoo, Mr. Burns, George Burns, Bill Murray, Pitbull, Yoda, Moby, Charlie Brown and, of course, the Dark Lord Voldemort.
Speaking of Voldemort, I almost forgot the most inescapable bald man on earth at this very moment, our 45th president, “He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.” Actually, that’s not a fair analogy. Donald Trump is more like “He-who-Must-be-Named-All-the-Time-Especially-by-Those-Who-Hate-him-Can’t-we-Just-Facebook-About-our-kids-pets-and-Artisinal-Food-for-one-day?”
Still, we lived to see it — we’re in the White House now! For the first time since Eisenhower, a Hairless-American president.
Now, I can’t speak to the size of Scott’s hands. … You’d need to ask Ellen about that.
For instance, my grandmother sent me her usual $25 birthday check with a memo directing me to use it for a haircut. Hate to break it to you grandma, but I lost most of my hair before the turn of the millennium. See, now that makes me feel old.
Incidentally, while premature baldness is a terrible joke to play on any human being, nature was especially cruel to me, considering I used to boast a head of flame-red, shoulder-length curls that would make Shaun White McTwist 1260 in his pants.
Baldness, it isn’t just a bad hair day, but the worst hair day, every day, until the day you die.
To borrow from James Brown: say it loud — I’m bald and I’m proud!
Nope. I’ve got no choice but to grin and bare scalp it. I mean, what else am I supposed to do? Grow a combover?
• Geoff Kirsch is an award-winning Juneau-based writer and humorist. “Slack Tide” appears every second and fourth Sunday.
