For as long as I can remember, I’ve lived in a constant state of panic. Worrywort McGee is what they call me, which I always thought was a stupid nickname. Anyhow, the other day, during one of my many anxiety attacks, Sean, a coworker of mine, peeled me off of the ceiling and said to me, “Dude, there’s no time for worry. Life is too short. Live each day as if it was your last.” Of course, normally, I would ignore such inane advice, but since nothing else I was doing seemed to be working, I figured it was time I tried something new.
So that’s exactly what I did.The next morning, instead of waking up in a mopey mood, I stayed in bed and thought about what a waste I’d made of my life: thirty-nine years of total bullshit. I cried in my pillow for two hours and then finally dragged myself out of bed. About halfway to the kitchen, I suddenly collapsed on the floor and started crying again: “Why me??!! What did I do??!! What the fuck did I do??!” After lying there in a heap for about ten minutes, I crawled back to bed.
Three hours later, I got up and put on a pair of sweat pants and my Fucked Company t-shirt that I never had the courage to wear in public. I didn’t see any point in trimming my beard or showering. Instead, I just called my voicemail to check my messages. Apparently, my boss was pretty pissed off. I suppose I should’ve called in sick, but I didn’t really give a shit. There was so much to do, so many places to see. I wanted to taste cotton candy again. I wanted to witness the miracle of child birth. I wanted to punch somebody in the face.
Yeah, hard to believe, but in my 39 years of existence, I’d never had the pleasure of punching somebody in the face. As a pacifist, it kind of goes against my nature. As soon as I throw a punch, my fist seems to stop just before impact. It’s embarrassing, to say the least. Humiliating to the point of nausea, to say the most. So while experiencing freshly spun sugar melting in my mouth would be great, and watching a baby’s head emerging from between a woman’s thighs would be fascinating, I decided that if I had to do anything on my last day on Earth, it would have to be punching somebody in the face. Now, the only question that remained was who. It certainly couldn’t be any of my friends, or anyone that I see day to day, for that matter. No, it would have to be a complete stranger (as opposed to a partial stranger), someone who really deserved it. And so, at three in the afternoon, I headed over to the local bar.
When I arrived at The Rusty Blade, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The grey paint on the outside was peeling, revealing a slightly greyer paint underneath. And its steel door had a series of protrusions on its surface, no doubt from the bouncer slamming an unruly patron’s head into it numerous times. I took a deep breath, placed my hand on the grimy door handle and made my way inside. Oddly enough, the interior of the bar wasn’t as dark as I had imagine it would be. It was brighter than day, lit by a series of twelve industrial-strength fluorescent fixtures. I closed my left eye and squinted the right, then approached the bar.
“Give me a whiskey in a dirty glass,” I said.
“Fuck off,” The bartender replied.
“I’m sorry?”
“We don’t want your kind in here.”
“My kind?”
“Yeah.”
“What kind would that be?”
He grabbed me by the front of my shirt and pulled me across the bar. “I said, get your hairy face out of my bar.”
I looked around the room and to my surprise, every person in the bar was cleanly shaven. Most of them even had their heads shaved. Those who didn’t were sporting crew cuts. Resisting the urge to cry and run away, I looked the bartender in the eye and said something I would later regret:
“And what if I refuse to leave?”
Almost immediately, all the patrons of the bar stood up and started to crowd around me.
“If I was you,” said the bartender, “I wouldn’t push it.”
“Yeah?” I paused and looked around, not so much for dramatic effect, but to stop myself from vomiting out of fear. “Well, you’re not me.”
With that, the bartender threw me back, causing me to fall into a crowd of beardless drunks who smelled like a combination of Marlboro cigarettes and Aqua Velva. They grabbed me by the arms and held me in place while the bartender made his way out from behind the bar.
“Well, boys,” he said, “looks like we’ve got ourselves another one.”
Suddenly, all the men started laughing, including me, though I have no idea why. But my jovial mood quickly changed the moment a fist found its way into my gut. As I collapsed, the bar patrons kindly held me up so I could receieve yet another blow—this time, in the ribcage. Again, the hairless freaks started to laugh. I lifted my head to see what was so funny, just in time to witness the bartender’s fist flying towards my face. I remember thinking “fuck that hurt,” just before I lost consciousness.
When I woke up, my head was throbbing and my stomach and sides were competing for attention. I wasn’t sure where I was, but there was a strange antiseptic scent in the air. I opened my swollen eyes to discover I was in an alleyway, resting uncomfortably on a pile of trash. And that scent, I suddenly figured out what it was: Aqua Velva. I quickly brought my hands to my face, and too my horror, my skin was as smooth as a freshly shaved baby’s rear end. Those bastards had pilfered my facial hair. Not only that, they’d shaved my head, which might have been cool, but I just don’t have the right head shape for that look. Anyhow, I eventually managed to get up and limp my way back towards home.
About six miles into my trip, I was waiting at the corner for the light to turn green, when you’ll never guess who I saw jogging across the street towards me. It was my coworker Sean.
“Hey,” he said. “What happened to you?”
“I musth uth ath ag awg,” I replied, not even sure what I was trying to say.
“Well, you look like you got into a fight with a gang of barbers and lost. Heh heh heh heh.”
“Futh ew,” I replied. That time, I knew exactly what I was trying to say.
“Hey, don’t be so down. It’s a good look for you. Besides, it’ll grow out eventually. Like I always say, life is too short. You’ve gotta live each day as if it was your last.”
And you know what? Sean was right. Sure, I had gotten into a bar fight and lost all of my hair in the process. But I also had an amazing adventure that I could tell people about for the rest of my life. And so I thanked Sean for his sage advice, and we shared a heterosexual hug and a hearty handshake. And then, without any hesitation, I punched that motherfucker in the face.
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