Hair has forever been such a crucial part of our beauty, i.e. good hair day, bad hair day. When our hair behaves for us, we are queens! Women in general spend a ton of money and time on cuts, color, and products! My current partner refers to me as “hair bear” and claims it was my hair that first attracted him, yet he is forever sending me pictures of women with short hairstyles and paying me high compliments when I wear my hair up.
After meeting his beloved childhood friend, Nina, I retorted, “Now I know why you want me to cut my hair!” She was gracious, kind and beautiful!
My hair is curly, but not kinky enough to stand up on its own. It gets super frizzy and I’m constantly adding product. Now, in my later years, it is becoming lack-luster and unruly. This is alarming as “hair” has been such a huge part of my identity.
Do you believe I’ve been wearing my hair the same way since high school? Ben is quick to remind me that this “hair that is too much” has been hanging out on my head for over 40 years!
My discussion with Ben the other night pissed me off and being pissed off is a new thing for me. This newfound ability to feel anger has led me to notice, digest and take right action. I started jotting down a cascade of traumatic memories regarding my hair, along with some deeply held beliefs. “If you are not feminine or attractive, you will not be loved”.
This started at a very young age when my mother would take me for a pixie cut. It was a thing in the 1960s and although I don’t remember caring about my hair, I do remember arriving home only to have my father tease me. He called me Patrick for days! I not only experienced deep shame, but felt he no longer loved me. I buried the feelings and never said a word. I’m sure he wasn’t even aware of the hurtful insult. but or me the message was loud and clear, “When your hair is short like that, you are a boy. You are no longer a pretty little girl.” I felt plain and ugly.
Jettisoning to the 70s, at the tender and awkward age of 13, I cut my smooth, relaxed waves off. Instant afro! Poof, it exploded out of nowhere! Puberty has played a cruel trick. A boy at school called me a squirrel.
In the 1980s, I began wearing my hair long and sweeping the front up with clips, as I felt the high top balanced my long thin face. I resembled a Johnston girl misplaced at Narragansett High School! But I truly didn’t have a choice for if left my hair to its own devices, it would flatten on top while the sides frizzed out to create pyramid head dread!
The years rolled by and I found myself a young mother far from home. I joined the NCO Wive’s Club and met Vicky, the only hairdresser at Williams Air Force Base, Arizona. One day I asked her to style my hair short and she refused. She callously stated, “Your neck it too long. You’ll look like a giraffe.”
Many years later, there was a waitress at The Cheesecake Factory in Providence who was drop dead gorgeous sporting a boy’s cut. I promptly asked for the name of the salon and excitedly walked into the East Side location the very next day. Good Lordy, I walked out a devastated and wounded bird. I was a boy giraffe!!!
There was nothing feminine about it. Nobody liked it, especially my husband and son. Worst of all, I hated myself for allowing my self-esteem to be so intricately entwined with my appearance. A few days later, I visited a salon in East Greenwich and the hairdresser practically gasped. She did her best to “soften it up”, as she put it. More shame.
Back in the 90s, my colleague and I taught English to the mothers of our MLL (multi-language learner) students. As these beautiful women learned English and gained confidence, they began cutting their hair shorter! This was a wonderful testimony to the power, strength and beauty of the sacred feminine.
And so, I am here in my 59th year of life, looking myself square in the eye, doing my best to process the past, heal, and rewire my brain. I’m still wearing the hair clips (soldiers, as Ben has playfully dubbed them)!
I have a cut/color scheduled for next Saturday. It may be time to circle around once more.
Patty
12/3/22