How true is the belief that a person’s white hairs represent his or her myriad worries? See, at 31, I have a smattering of them already—20 strands or more plus those at the back of my head that I can neither see nor count—and I wonder, is it normal to have this much white hair at my age or have I been inordinately worried the past years?
I started noticing one or two white strands five or so years ago and I’ve gotten to the habit of plucking them since. It is believed that plucking “gray” hair causes two to grow back. But then, men of science have declared this to be a myth. According to them, “graying” is simply a result of the aging process, something to do with hair losing color due to a decrease in melanin production.
This leaves me with the theory that hair turn white due to worries. I try to recall some major heartaches in the past that may have been the culprits to my “graying” and part of this list was my uncle’s seven-year battle with cancer (which ended in 2004). Since I’m a natural worrier (my philosophy is that if I worry and obsess about something enough, maybe it wouldn’t happen), I still worry over trifles, but things are so much better for me now that I wake up thanking God everyday for my good, uneventful little life.
So, how to make peace with these unsightly, stringy white hairs on my head? Some say to look at them as signs that one is growing in wisdom; others say that they are simply signs that one is growing old. Me, I guess I’ll start regarding them as badges—markers that I’ve survived this much and this long. Others my age have unfortunately perished for some reason or another: poverty, illness, bad luck. Some have simply given up. But, me, I’m alive, in one piece, none the worse for wear, a bit banged up, yes, but ultimately still optimistic, happy.
