Young & Old, Now & Then

Nature has a sense of humor.

Just look at my face.

(That’s not the punchline,
though it would be
a pretty sick playground burn.
It’s just the setup.)

So, as I was saying,
my face.

Somehow
there are white hairs
sprouting from my otherwise red beard
I would say “invading” but the invasion is over
They are residents.
They come to HOA meetings and post on NextDoor.
They wave absently as they walk their dogs.
I wave back with a flimsy smile.
I pretend to know their names.
They pretend to know mine.
Real American residents.

Somehow
there are crows feet too,
Goose(crow?)stepping in the corners of my eyes
Crackling out like
little jagged tributaries
Fanning out like
a fan.

And somehow
there are also
zits.
pimples.
whiteheads.
blemishes.
The dreaded detritus
of teenagedom.
How?
How does my skin bear the unwelcome, oily symbols of youth
While also hosting the symbols of the aged?
At the same time?

Is it a reflection of my interior life,
Immaturity duking it out with maturity,
wherein I don’t feel like people should expect adulthood-level things from me?
Where I’m basically, on the inside, still just 20-Something Paul,
wanting to listen to great music
eat great (greasy) food
lollygag and the like?
Is the zit/crow/whitehair combo an outward manifestation
Of arrested development?

Or is it that proverbial
opposition in all things?
The yins
the yangs?

Is it a reminder
that it’s possible
for two things to be true,
To hold two seemingly opposite ideas in your head?
Or on your face,
in my case.

Are my pores just messing with me?
Laughing to each other
Slapping knees
Hard of breath
as they decide which thing to send out
A red hair?
A white hair?
A pimple?
Hilarious.

When I’m feeling extra-pouty
it seems
unfair.

And it seems
cosmically humorous
when I’m
less pouty.

When I was 15 and I’d break out
I’d comfort myself by
mentally fast forwarding to my 20’s
“Then!” I envisioned,
“Then my skin will clear up.”
“Then my marginal handsomeness
will really come to the fore!”
“Then everything will be perfect.”

That did not happen.
My 20’s were just as dermatologically unpredictable.
I spent my 30’s with a subscription to Proactiv.

I am in my 40's now.
And while the zit situation is not as drastic
or dramatic
As it often could be in my younger years,
when it staged an ongoing violent coup
on an already wildly insecure face,

It’s still not clear.
By any stretch.
I still use products made by a company called
Acne.org
Everyday.
Some days it’s still positively pubescent even.

So much for “Then!”

All I’ve got is “now.”
(with all its white-hairs and whiteheads.)