Simon Rushworth
It is with a great sense of sadness that I pen this week’s blog. I offer my thoughts with a profoundly heavy heart (and a strangely light head). Indeed there is no escaping it. No hiding from it. No ignoring the fact that right here, right now, rushonrock is struggling to coming to terms with a sudden and most shocking loss.
Hair loss.
I know it can happen to most of us in our mid 20s. In the case of new dad and Eagles fan Rick (he was always old before his time) it happened in his teens.
But I’m talking about a natural process. Where your mane thins beyond your control and that bald patch grows faster than your beer belly.
To cull a fine head of hair willingly, with wanton zeal, is another matter altogether. A crime against masculinity. And yet tonight I sit here like a once rutting ram shorn of his prized fleece with nobody to blame but myself.
The question now is can I credibly rock without my mullet? Can I hurl myself headlong (not as long as yesterday, obviously) into the greasy, mousse-laden, fringeless world of heavy metal and still enjoy the music?
For the first time since the foundation of rushonrock I no longer boast a greater length than Self Made Man. (He has always claimed victory in the volume stakes. But then many a fine figure of a man has tried and failed to beat our outspoken blogger in the battle for critical mass).
I am facing a Metallica concert in five days’ time with what can only be described as a short, back and sides with a slight point on top.
I look like I should be working in a bank. I look like a right banker.
I definitely don’t look anything like Cormac Neeson from The Answer and that was, until this morning, where I was heading. In my head. Under that hair.
I was striving for the flowing locks which have adorned many a metal mag over the years. And excited many a rock chick in the process.
I was aiming to be Cormac, Coverdale and Cooper all rolled into one. Hell, if I couldn’t play like a rocker at least I could look like one. But I can’t.
I didn’t have the stomach for the fight, the staying power to succeed or the pay packet to afford tube after tube of hair gel. Now I have a little tub of clay for my little head of hair. But I’m told it will last for ages.
Will it last longer than the guilt, the sadness or the sense of loss? Will my ears ever be warm again? Can I expect SMM to resign on the spot? Forget The Answer and feel the questions.
It’s going to be a tough time for everyone. Friends, family, colleagues and fellow rockers. My first aim is to make it through Metallica. After that anything is possible.
Hair today gone tomorrow. I could be.