Follically Challenged

When I think of bald heads, I think of classics like Yul Brynner, or Michael Jordan. Just this past week I saw an old picture of Mike when he was playing at the University of North Carolina. It got me to thinking about how fortunate I am to have a skull that allows exhibition to the rest of the world. The husband of one of my dear friends decided to shave his head a year or so ago and it turned out that his cabeza was not ready for prime time. This meant an uncomfortable period of weeks during which all the bumps and scars that were once kept quietly shrouded in a protective envelope of fur were on display for all to see.
Early in my adolescence I began to subscribe to my father's assertion that "God made a lot of good heads, and the ones he messed up he covered with hair." My forehead was high even back in kindergarten, so I had resigned myself to a life of hair challenges. In high school I gave one last shot at tonsorial splendour by growing a shaggy little afro that managed to hold off the inevitable for a few more years. By the time I was a junior in college, no one was checking my I.D. Still, when the drunken bets started up - "I'll give you fifty bucks to shave your head," - I passed. I was still vainly attached to my vanity. "Hair makes the man," right?
Imagine Donald Trump without his signature comb-over. On April 1, Vince McMahon and Donald Trump will have a wrestler compete on each's behalf in the "Battle of the Billionaires" at WrestleMania 23 in Detroit. If Umaga beats Bobby Lashley, McMahon will give Trump a buzzcut. If Lashley, Trump's rep, wins, McMahon will sport a new look. No word on exactly what look McMahon might end up with, but anything would be an improvement. If the Donald's scalp is as terrifying as the follicles that currently surround it, then we could be in for a very ugly revelation.
In the end, any transaction that takes place on a pay-per-view event that features fake wrestling on April Fool's Day is suspect in the extreme, and I can only hope that both men give their wager the honor and respect that it so richly deserves. And now, Yul Brynner with hair.