I'm about ready to contact the Raelians to see if they can do something about this hairline of mine.

Ever since my adolescence turned me from an insecure, pasty, zit-faced teenager into an insecure, pasty, zit-faced grownup, my adult life has been one long stream of accepting things I'm unsatisfied with about myself.

(Webster's Dictionary defines "adolescence" as "the transition from denial to acceptance. See also: GET USED TO IT, KID.")

In recent years, however, I managed to come to terms with most of my shortcomings, reasoning that since I inherited the mental and creative strengths of my mother's side of the family, I could agree to the physical atrocities handed down to me by my father. These paternal traits were not easy to accept, as they include:

1) A nose upon whose bridge one could land an F-18 fighter jet

2) Near-legal blindness, for which I would wear contact lenses were it not for both the hereditary sensitivity of my eyes, and the fact that without glasses, my perceived nose size increases by half (see #1)

3) Hideous, unnaturally veiny feet

4) Two choices in physique, depending on one's level of discipline:

a) Incredibly skinny
b) Incredibly skinny with pot belly

5) An inordinate amount of hair that, while serving as a reminder that our species is descended from the apes (or possibly Robin Williams), grows from bodily places which should no longer have the genetic capacity for follicular growth

And there was no reason to think I would be any different, until I looked in the mirror several weeks ago, noticed two spots at the upper edges of my crown that seemed to have crept back a few millimeters, and remembered that my mother's father has a head so bald you could bowl with it.

Why didn't I think of this before? I suppose the fact had been escaping me, since I thought all my physical traits had come from my father's side of the family. And you don't really notice my mom's dad is bald, honestly, because he's got the right kind of head for it.

This is not true of all of us. You know those ridiculous magazine polls where a sampling of supposedly average women say they think bald men are sexy? Those polls crack me up. Yes, I say to myself, of course you say a bald man is sexy - provided he has a perfectly round head, a movie star's face and a fit, muscle-bound body. This is likely the same woman who thinks a man with glasses is sexy, so long as the prescription is weak enough that lovemaking without them does not render him so blind he is unable to distinguish between her and the pink leather wingchair. And this is the same woman who claims that a Sense of Humor is the first thing she looks for in a man, then a week after they get together, breaks up with him for being too immature.

But that is beside the point. What we were talking about, I think, was head shape, and my head is the wrong shape to be losing my hair. Bruce Willis' head is the right shape. Bruce Willis is the kind of guy who, when he saw he was losing his hair, simply cut it short and started making lame comedies, knowing that the biggest threat to his image was not whether or not he had hair, but whether or not he had a spouse who had more silicone than a NASA laboratory and less talent than Benji the Dog. (Wisely, he got rid of her, too.)

My friend Eric did this as well (shaved all his hair off, I mean, he didn't divorce Demi Moore). He has been balding for years, and one summer decided to turn the issue on its head (har!) by going completely bald and growing a beard. This was a terrific idea except for the fact that he is a teacher, and when he went back to school he scared the living excrement out of his students by appearing as though his head had been turned upside down and re-mounted, top-first, back onto his neck.

But it still looked better than I would look, because I have a thin, asymmetrical head, one that without hair would qualify me immediately for the National Dork Patrol Math Teacher Look-Alike Contest. You remember the little skinny guy from Evening Shade, the one who plays Mr. Noodle on Sesame Street? This is not a man who is fighting off chicks who are lustily groping at his peach fuzz.

I will live. I could have it much worse; a large percentage of my older friends had lost most of their hair already by the time they were my age. (Granted, half of them are imaginary and the other half are women, but they help me muddle through.) And I think I've got plenty of time left -- I estimate I will be completely bald right on time for my midlife crisis, which I am tentatively scheduling for April, 2024, weather permitting. By that time, perhaps the Raelians will be able to give me some sort of gene replacement therapy to teach my deoxyribonucleotides once and for all where hair is and is not supposed to grow.

And I could get lucky. To be truthful, I'm still not 100% sure I'm actually losing my hair. The difference is almost imperceptible, really. It could very well be a rogue cowlick that has spontaneously developed up there, that will migrate to the back of my head with time.

As you can see, I'm still making the transition. Today: denial, tomorrow: acceptance.

The day after that, I'm buying a rug.

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