Looking in my bathroom mirror this morning I spotted something glinting amongst my chest hair. Perhaps there was some buried treasure in there. That would be awesome.
But it was not awesome. The glinting came from a white hair nestling amongst the brown. I looked more carefully and spotted two more of the buggers, all surprisingly long - they'd been there for ages, patiently waiting for me to notice.
Not my chest hair. I expect this nonsense from the hair on my head and even in my beard - they're just showing off because they know people can see them. But my chest is usually hidden away, only to be unleashed when my wife expressly asks to have a look at it, so how could my own chest hair betray me.
I dealt ruthlessly with this insurrection (ins-hair-rection) and plucked out the offenders, who probably didn't feel so clever for being long now, did they? A few innocent brown hairs were taken down in the process. But you can't make an omelette out of hair without breaking some hair. In years to come I may regret removing brown hair needlessly, but for now the browns are the majority and the whites the persecuted minority. The opposite of what you would expect in this racist world, right? I am going to write a Planet of the Apes style allegory about this to show the world that all racism is wrong - apart from when it comes to hair where dark is good and white is wrong. And blondes and gingers are also persecuted. It will be a meaningless and confused analogy which is offensive to everyone. That is the best kind of satire.
But if my chest hair is going grey then where will this end? What will come next? Oh no, you don't think? The move southwards can't continue, can it? You know what I'm thinking. Please God don't let this affect my toe hair. I pride myself on having the youngest looking toes in the United Kingdom. People might look at my face and think, hey that guys probably about 29, maybe a young looking 30 (they do do that), but if I ever just poke my bare feet round the corner of a door people will usually exclaim, "Wow, look at those youthful digits. If I was going to guess the age of the person attached to them I would say he or she was 19 maximum." Then I come into the room and they say, "Gosh, we got that wrong, in fact he or she (I still can't tell) is 29, maybe a young looking 30."
I then say, "Well thanks for the compliment, especially on the toes, but I am actually 45."
Then the people always say, "No way, that's not possible. You're clearly wearing some kind of fake toe to make you look younger, a lot of people are doing that these days, because no one wants to put their foot around a door and have their age judged wildly too high." Then they will pull at the toe and see that it is actually connected to me and probably speculate that I've had some kind of toe transplant, perhaps I am some kind of foot vampire who goes around at night cutting off the toes of youthful people and then attaching them to my foot stump so it looks like my toes are young.
I then point out that that is quite an unlikely scenario, that surely there would be some scarring and also newspaper reports of people losing their toes in bizarre nocturnal situations and isn't the more likely scenario that I have just looked after my toes and kept them looking young.
They concede that it is more likely, but are not going to commit themselves 100% to that theory in case the toe vampire thing transpires to be true.
We make an uneasy truce, I put my shoes on and the party continues with a couple of people at the edges mumbling about why I had chosen to enter the room in such a bizarre fashion, but I know that they're only acting like that because they're jealous of my young toes.
But fuck, if my toe hair goes grey, then the jig is up. I could dye my toe hair, but you can always tell when someone has done that. And in the confines of a hot shoe the dye would run and even if I wore open-toed sandals then the dye would get splashed by rain and puddles and also people would think I was a dick for having open toed sandals (and clearly dyed toe hair).
I think my toe round the door antics might nearly be over, but I intend to make hay while the sun shines and enjoy the crepescular moments of my young looking toes before ravaging time wrecks the constant toe partying that I've been doing.
It was just a little shock to see grey hairs spreading in this mildly alarming fashion. Whilst it would be cool if God had invented a world where we didn't age, I have to accept that He did. Even if that seems like a cruel trick that a masochist would play, especially if He didn't Himself age and up to that point the concept of ageing didn't exist.
But given that God is mentally ill and cruel we have to accept that our bodies change and decay and that our minds will slowly crumble to dust and I'd rather have this happen than just cease to exist, which is my only other option (again, death, another great move from an immortal God - what's Your fucking problem, dude?). It's good that it happens gradually so we have a chance to get used to it all bit by bit.
I kinda quite like going grey. But not my chest hair or my toe hair or..... Oh gosh, I've just caught up with what you were thinking five minutes ago. Please God, not that. I thought there was one young looking appendage through the door prank that I'd be able to play til I was 100. And a few grey hairs won't stop that. Nor will the fact that it's the door of the supermarket.
And then I got off the bus.
28 years old, was how old my penis looked at the time.
My latest Metro column is
here. I hope you enjoy the way that there are subtly offensive things all the way through it followed by immediate apologies and clarifications.
