GRAY'S ANOMALY

Things are getting hairier. On my head. (Let’s not talk about ears, brows and nose, please.) As a woman said to me at the gym last week, I’m getting shaggier. She meant it as a compliment. I think. 

 

Yes, I’m letting my hair grow out to some proximation of my Big Hair ’80s era. My hair has certainly receded in the passing decades and it’s thinner but the top of the noggin is still well covered and, for that, I am grateful. I think bald men can be very sexy, but I tell myself my head needs hair. Too many moles hide underneath. 

 

They are still hiding, aren’t they? 

 

Hair insecurity makes me reluctant to look too long into the hand mirror that mostly gathers dust in the bathroom vanity. 

 

I’m letting the hair grow out while I still have hair to grow out. It means that the cleaner, closer-cut, left-parted haircut—I call it my “Swedish cut” after seeing so many immaculately, conservatively groomed men during trips to Stockholm—is giving way to big curls. The back of the head, in particular, is curling up. 

 

“Just don’t grow a mullet,” everyone says. 

 

The fact they say that makes me realize it is, in fact, looking a little mullet-y at the moment. Without hand mirror scrutiny, I believe I’m in the awkward phase of growing things out. It’ll get better, I keep telling myself. My hairstylist will have to clean up the neckline during my next visit. 

 

I’m also sprouting facial hair—mustache and beard. When I was twenty and in my first year of teaching—yes, in the ’80s—I grew a mustache to try to look older. I was a high school special education teacher and some of my students were a year older since Texas law permitted students to be enrolled in secondary school until they were twenty-one. I’m rather thankful I don’t have any photos from that period. I don’t think it was a good luck. 

 

This is the first time I’ve attempted a beard. I’ve sometimes been a lazy shaver, letting facial whiskers linger for up to ten days but then I’ve always felt uncomfortably itchy, causing me to lather up the shaving cream and revert to a smoother look. I’m now about six weeks into the beard. It seems as full as it’s likely to get. The itching has subsided. My boyfriend and my best friend are fans of the beard. “You look Scandinavian,” I am told. I will always take that as a compliment. 

 

So far, I’ve gone to the barber twice for beard trims with electric razors. (The thought of a blade trim worries me too much. I imagine myself flinching at the wrong moments and having my chin, cheeks and neck gushing blood.) The process is quite soothing and extremely detail-oriented. I imagine it’s something like having a massage…which I’ve never had. (The thought of my body being needed like bread dough is as appealing as a bloody blade shave.) 

 

Arr, Graybeard!

I’ve come close to getting rid of the beard several times. A few more days, I keep telling myself. I am conflicted by the look. While my hair is blond with some gray growing in, the beard is one hundred percent gray. I feel old. I look like a skinny version of Santa. (Am I even that skinny? Do kids I pass do a double-take. “Santa?!”)

 

Without the beard, I look considerably younger than sixty. With it, I feel sixty-five. I keep asking myself why I would sacrifice looking more youthful? What’s the beard’s appeal?

 

This weekend, my boyfriend, Evan, suggested I dye the beard and mustache. One box of Just For Men blond beard dye and—Bam!—I lost a decade. (Maybe more?) 

 

Somewhat blonder facial scruff...

So now I’m a big, shaggy faker. I have blond highlights in my hair and blond dye for my beard. I am relieved. I’d even say I am happy. I am no longer peeking into the bathroom mirror with dread. The beard will stay a while longer, at least.

 

The concern now is about whether I’ll know when to say my final goodbyes to all blondness. There will come a time when the color will look blatantly painted on, when people will see me for the blond fraud I am, an old guy trying unsuccessfully to look younger. I’ve seen it in other men and women. I just wonder if I’ll see it in me. Will I know when to let the dyes die? Will it take friends and family holding a hair intervention? Will someone slide an anonymous note under my door? “Today’s the day for you to go gray.”

 

For now, I believe I still have enough natural, non-gray hairs on my head to carry off the blond deception. When it’s all gray, may I have the common sense to let things be. Frankly, I think a full head of gray hair can be sexy, too. It can look distinguished. It can convey confidence. It’s possible, I have self-esteem issues around the terms sexy, distinguished and confident. Maybe the real work to be done is inside the head rather than at surface level.