Some bald truths

Rajan Kapoor  

OF late, I realise that it is not only history that repeats itself, but also baldness has a penchant for repetition. And, as a ‘bald witness to this bald fact’, I can vouch for it. My strange observation stems from my personal experience. 

Once, my revered father was ‘invaded’ by a fungus. It caused red patches on his hands and legs, besides causing nagging irritation. When all homemade remedies to cure the recalcitrant fungus  yielded  no result, I took my father to the Civil Hospital, Amritsar. After examining my father, the doctor prescribed some medicines to be taken for a fortnight. Further, he added that there was nothing serious about the infection and it was a seasonal ‘gift’ and would be cured easily. Relieved by the doctor’s reassuring and soothing words, I was about to thank him, when my father thrust my head under the nose of the doctor   and abruptly put a poser to him: ‘Bald patches are fast making inroads into the scalp of my son. Could this condition be stopped, if not reversed?’ 

Confused, the doctor appeared miffed, but maintaining his composure, took a torch and put its spotlight on the little ‘crescent moons’ that had starting appearing on my head. After a thorough examination, he decreed that it was a case of genetic corruption and my receding hairline could not be arrested. He also drew  hair follicles on the OPD slip to elaborate on how genetic disturbances led to hair loss. We kept looking at the figures without making a head or tail of his  technical lecture on hair loss. After he put forth his point, he wrote a long list of medicines to be consumed by the patient to stall hair loss. 

All of sudden, I asked the doctor who would first take the medicines — me or my father? Realising that my statement had confused him, I explained my ‘concern’ in detail. My hair growth would become possible only when the genes of my father got ‘corrected’, and for that, my father had to strictly follow the course of the prescribed medicines. When the doctor realised the true import of my words, he laughed out loud and tore the prescription slip. He announced that I had  properly  understood  what was referred to in medical terminology as genes-induced alopecia. 

 A few years later, I again had a bald encounter with history, though it was not set off by genetic corruption. One day, I took my little one to college  after a month after her ‘mundan’.   To a query of one of my women colleagues on the moderate growth of hair on my daughter’s head, the little one shot back: ‘Mere to baal aanay lag gayain, papa ke abhi take nahi aaye!’  

Baldness came a full circle that day!