Hair today Gone Tomorrow

I have been having steadily for the past 3 years going bald.

Everyday my pillow is a battlefield strewn with the bodies of my dear departed follicles, follicles who were once proud regal upright untamed beasts residing in the forest of my scalp. But pollution and the ravages of time have laid to waste these noble warriors. I dutifully collect them in the palm of my hand and say a prayer for these old friends and companions of mine before i deposit their bodies respectfully into the waste bucket.

My forehead has a singular mission in life, its lakshya so to say. It is in the tradition of great conquerors of the Napoleonic era, bent on conquering new lands and new territories and it's eventual goal is to extend its kingdom to the back of my neck. Or at the minimum it wants to win the game of oneupmanship against Anupam Kher's scalp.

For the past few years I have been a mute witness to this carnage. It has greatly saddened me no doubt, but I took it philosophically as terminally lazy people are oft to do. I was maybe hoping that everything would automatically be all right. People whom I consulted in the matter, namely my mother and my father, assured me that I was worrying about nothing. This was not a genocide of follicles that I was witnessing, merely a culling of some of the more unhealthy ones among the general population. They assured me that at the end of it all I would be left with a strong but still numerous batch, ones who deservedly remained.

Thus I managed to still the malignant doubts and fears in my heart up unto now. But the mirror never lies. It showed the pain, bald truth from all vantage angles and finally at the end of three years of being a non-combatant I was finally ready for some action. To quote Bill Pullman who played the President of the United States in Independence Day:
"We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day the world will declare in one voice: "We will not go quietly into the night!" We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!"
(Hear original speech here)

Suitably inspired I contacted a dear friend of mine who had been undergoing the same problems, who had decided to battle against it and who ... atleast according to him ... was beginning to win. I will not name him over here. I will simply refer to him as my benevolent benefactor.

I had heard strange rumours come out from the more well-known purveyors of anti-hair fall treatments ... The Batras ... of immense fees and prolonged treatment periods ... and I willingly followed my friend to a place which he assured me would treat me quickly and effectively.

My benevolent benefactor took me to a see a doctor two evenings ago, one who had supplied him with the necessary ammunition he required to win back his lost territory. And what a strange evening it turned out to be...

(To be continued ... )