Looks

For some reason I can't quite peg, I've been getting compliments about my looks lately. Nothing major, just little things. (Except for Rob who said I was looking skinnier...if anything I've put on some needed weight). I'm not great about accepting compliments. My overly logical mind that believes everything needs a qualifier doesn't help. "There is no black or white, only gray." I'm trying to get better at it, learning to just say "thank you."

I'm not 100% sure what has changed about me. Someone mentioned that I wear shirts that are to big for me so I've been trying to wear shirts that fit. Problem is that I have a lot of shirts that ARE too big, so my choices are limited. I have 3 plain black t's that fit well... but then I worry that every time people see me they think I'm wearing the same darn shirt. But I do get complimented when in those black t's. Odd that.

I've always been self-conscious about my stick figure of a physique. I've dressed it it in larger clothes in an attempt to cover up. That of course just makes me look like a scarecrow.

People seem to like the hair. I know that my hair is at this magical period right now where it looks good. Actually it just passed through it. Now, I can tame it with gel but that won't last much longer. Soon it will be become un-containable, like a cloud of toxic gas pouring from a Union Carbide explosion. But my curiosity about what it will look like is too hard to pass up.

I could (and will) go in the get the sides and back trimmed, but I don't think people quite realize the complexity of the entity that is my hair. In all my years I have had ONE (and only one) barber and/or stylist that has been able to really do anything with it. He worked up in Westchester, NY. It even took him two months to figure my hair out. You see, at a certain point it passes into non-Euclidean geometry. Parallel lines that meet. Curves that are also angles. Three points that don't form a triangle or a straight line. So I have little hope.

But it has been nice to be complimented. In general, boys don't get complimented about their looks. When we do, it is often delivered with an unintentional tone of surprise. "Hey, you actually look nice today!"

Of course there are things about my aging body people don't see. Like The One Hair. I have always been bare chested (something I'm grateful for). But in the last six months The One Hair arrived. Every two weeks it grows, in the center of my chest, like a lone tree growing on a bared desert plane. I'll feel it before I see it. I'll rub my hand across to chest and feel it. Then I must wait a week until it grows enough to get purchase with the tweezers. Defiantly, it seems to have the ability to dodge my attempts at removal and it turns into 15 minutes of me swearing at the mirror as I play a reverse miniature version of grabbing a stuffed frog with a robotic crane.

It is hard to feel attractive after moments like that.