just saying

I was running on the bike path today and saw a man with a toupee. It made me sad. I wanted to tell him that a baseball cap or a fedora would look so much better, that by wearing this fake hair, he not only made himself look older but kind of pathetic. For the remainder of my 4 mile run, my thoughts raced to our culture's fear of aging, thinking I might be just as guilty. 

I realize that most people over the age of 26 really don’t want to get older. Actually, for me it wasn’t until I reached 34, but that's another story altogether. My 20's was about finding myself outside the confines of high school cliques and normalcy of home. I read Henry Miller and Anais Nin and watched foreign movies while drinking red wine that I legally purchased. Ahh...so liberating. I traveled to other continents and discovered that, unbeknownst to me at the time, I grew up in a very privileged society, and that no, not everyone has access to free education, let alone flushable toilets and toilet paper that is not made from newsprint. This was also the time that I found out that men are boys who fall into the same trappings as women, that we all harbor some level of insecurity and in the end want to find acceptance. This is youth. Exploring. Finding. Missing the mark. All that stuff of life. 

Attempting to change physical features only fools yourself and others for a short time, if at all. To feel youthful, shouldn't we do the things that make us grow? Sounds like a contradiction, but it's not. I think of all the "young at heart" people in my life and see a very common denominator. Forget the botox. The lifts. The toupees. Especially the toupees. Ironically, rather than make anyone look younger, these masks become reminders that we are all getting old. Just age gracefully. Smile more - so what if this means more wrinkles. Be kind. Do things that make you happy. If you don’t know what that is, find out. Try new things. Wish for things, and believe they can actually come true. Praise jobs well done. Have compassion. Laugh. But whatever you do, please don’t wear a toupee.