The human mind is an amazing thing. It can solve the complexities of the universe, generate ideas and images from the depths of your imagination, and literally find ANYTHING to stress about.
It's not that I don't have anything to worry about – I'm job searching, budgeting my finances, getting rejected from literary agents and jobs all day errryday, it's an election year, we're in a pandemic, CA is burning, systemic racism is everywhere, hurricanes have gained superpowers – but, there's not the typical, daily worries that usually fill the time. Yes, I have gaping, existential-dread-type worries, but I don't have to worry whether Susan will read my email before lunch or Eric will complete his 3-point starter quiz before the boss checks the status!
So, my mind has found things.
The most bizarre manifested this week; well, I should say, it started about 2 weeks ago but reached its hair-raising conclusion today.
So, I do spend between 4-5 hours a day doing writing work, job searching, copyediting, publishing research, et. al. It keeps me busy (read: staves off the existential dread). But, starting 2 weeks ago, I would sit down to write and then… Carmella would show up.
She'd appear out of the corner of my eye, swaying through the air-conditioned breeze. I'd be trying to focus on writing, but … there'd she be. When it was too much, I'd wet my hand and try to swat her away, but she was very obnoxious. She did not like to be ignored.
Carmella is a roughly 3/4-inch hair that decided to grow out of my elbow.
If you've ever seen me, you know that my hair is like white and barely noticeable. Recently, however, my body decided to kick into a new evolutionary gear. I don't know what the 45 new chest hairs are supposed to help with, but they are now there and should be able to help if I need to hide in a wild accountant's bald spot.
So, I have erratic, new chest hair, and then existing hairs have decided to like GO FOR IT. These weird ones are on my eyebrows, in my nose and ears, and, with Carmella, on my elbow. They decided that since Tedd is in his mid-30s, it is time to shine.
For additional context, I've always been very confused about the male body. I have 5 brothers but we never like ~talked~ about how bodies work. My sex education was my mother handing me a book called "Where Did I Come From?" when I was 10. Because of that book, I thought masturbation had something to do with lightning for a solid 2 years. (That was the picture… a kid in a bed and lightning and then a very ambiguous description of how it worked.) When I was 15 and started getting hairs on the top of my feet, I thought there was something really wrong with me.
"Models and actors on TV never have hair anywhere! Is part of my DNA a wild animal?!"
Eventually the internet filled in some gaps, and here we are. But the trauma remains.
Anyway, with the nose/chest/ear hair primadonnas, I could figure it out. I groom stuff. But, Carmella and her 3 other Hair-mazon friends on my arm… I just didn't know what to do.
That was the reason I decided to ignore them, because… Like, what can I do? Shave my whole arm? Is that necessary? Do I just trim them? Grab a pair of scissors? Is it enough? Other hairs are growing longer… like, how do I cut them off before they join Carmella's movement?
Normally, if I had a job and such, I could put this into perspective: "I mean, it's 3 hairs on my arm. No one notices and they're tiny and white."
But, having nothing but time and these hairs, it became harder and harder.
Then, the other day I was running errands and had to drop something off at Kohl's (If you're wondering, no I didn't get new Kohl's Cash. I had to make a return because I'm budgeting and had to run quickly in and out lest I find the graphic tee section and spend $40 on new Zelda shirts.)
I got to Kohl's like 10 minutes before it opened, though, and I had to sit in the car. In that position, at roughly 9:50 am in direct sunlight, I was horrified.
All the hairs on my arm lit up and I could do nothing but stare at them. Kohl's wouldn't open for 10 minutes and it was just me, Carmella, and her mob. And, in the light, my arm had 1 million hairs I hadn't noticed.
"When did I become Cousin It?!" I was mesmerized. Where did this plumage come from?
I think it's important to note that body hair can be very sexy. There's like sexy hair, which is usually grown by people who can… well, grow hair. But mine is drunk, multi-colored pubic hair. It just… doesn't look good anywhere. It's always sparse, usually variegated, and almost always longer and spideryier than it should be.
In the Kohl's parking lot, I made the immediate decision that they had to go – like all of them. Carmella had blitzkrieged my elbow and I could no longer be a pacifist.
Post-Kohl's I went home and went to work. It was like surgery. I got out anything I could find that took care of hair: scissors, a comb, clippers, clipper guards, the works.
My first act was to get rid of the tiny knuckle hairs that had popped up. In a manic fury, I just ran them over with a razor.
There was a moment of regret.
"What… what if it looks weird. What if I have to shave my whole arm? Can I do that? What happens?!"
I pulled away the clippers and…
You… could…
Barely notice I had cut anything.
This was the moment when I was like "Oh… I am probably the only person on planet earth who even noticed Carmella. She wasn't plotting elbow domination… she was just sayin' 'hi.'"
I still did trim the rest – I ended up trying kind of everything. I cut with scissors a bit. I like combed it and used the clippers. The best ended up being the clippers with a 2 guard – this allowed for an even shearing, leaving some hairs, but also keeping Carmella looking fresh with a cute bob.
In the end, I felt better, ready to take on the world. Carmella was tamed. My knuckles and hands resembled those of a teenage girl, and I even gave myself a little shave, trimming up the 40 red, black, brown, and blond hairs that make up my "goatee."
It's definitely not sexy hair, but it's cute enough to impress the staff at Kohl's the next time I'm in, and if things continue in a downward spiral, I can still look forward to getting a little thrill next time there's some lightning.