Naked Mole Rat

Bearded Tony Lopresti circa 1978. Photo Credit: Peter Rosen

Originally published by The Prismatist, an online magazine.

My name is Tony Lopresti and I think I am turning into a heterocephalus glaber, otherwise known as a naked, or hairless, mole rat.

It all started in 2021 when I had gall bladder surgery. The prep on surgery day included shaving my midsection from just below my chest to my lower abdomen. My body hair had been dark and thick since I was a kid.

I remember one day in fifth grade at Our Lady of Lourdes parish school in Philadelphia. We had a bathroom break – a bunch of ten-year old boys in sports coats, collared shirts, ties, dress pants and shiny leather shoes lined up on one side of the corridor. The girls in navy blue uniforms with white collars, saddle shoes and white bobby socks lined up on the other side. A vigilant nun made sure we stayed in line and stayed quiet so as not to disturb the classes that were still in session. 

I entered the boys’ room and walked past the row of stalls toward the full-length urinals. Standing up against one of them in the ready position was … let’s call him Joey D. Around Joey D stood three other boys giggling and staring down at him and pointing. I stopped in my tracks. One of them said in a half-whisper, “Hey, Lopresti, look! Joey D’s got a pubic hair!”

Joey D was a really nice kid. He was kind-hearted and gentle, but he was a bundle of nerves. He was so nervous that on test days he would turn pale and throw up over and over again. He just couldn’t take a test. He was smart but he couldn’t handle the stress of having to show it on paper. I always felt really bad for him. So I didn’t have the heart to tell him and the guys that I already had three.

I just said, “Great, Joey!” I went about my business and left.

I expected after surgery that my hair would grow back quickly and thickly. But it didn’t. It came in slowly and was more fuzz than hair. Little by little in the several years since, my hair has been disappearing, sometimes seemingly overnight. I raised my arm one day to apply deodorant and was shocked that there was no hair in my arm pit. Well, there’s a bit of hair but it’s soft and colorless. My chest hair, my arm hair, my leg hair … all disappearing. My beard, however, continues to grow thick and rough albeit mostly white and gray.

These are the daily reminders that I have very many more years behind me than ahead of me.

But wait! A TV commercial! A special razor for men designed to shave off all body hair! All the men in the ad were youthful and muscular … and hairless! Totally hairless! So perhaps I am part of a cosmetic trend - the smooth-skinned hairless modern man!

Probably not.

I might take some solace in knowing that the naked mole rat lives nine times longer than any other rat species.

But it lives underground in total darkness. I have to live in the light and see myself everyday as I change with age, as deficits begin to make themselves known, as strengths begin to weaken, as energy wanes more quickly.

The Mayo Clinic says age can cause hair loss in men. The only cure is death.

But not yet.

I wonder how Joey D is doing…