I find hair to be, well, interesting. I mean, yes, it is just hair and there are more important things in the world to think about. I am not obsessed with it, but I will admit to thinking about it. Hair, or lack thereof, is an identifying characteristic for us humans.
What we do with our hair is usually a personal choice. But, sometimes it can be a business choice. Sometimes it can be a cultural choice. For some, like professional athletes and celebrities, it is can be all three.
Occasionally, while we are watching a TV show or a ballgame, my wife and I will critique the hairstyles we see. Usually, I’ll start it. I’ll identify a particularly unique hairstyle and say, “How about that hair?” Then we (usually me) make snarky comments about it. Seems as though baseball players are especially into weird, wild, and wacky hair. There is a player on the Phillies, Brandon Marsh, who insists on playing with wet hair. Not damp, wet. It is quite long and stringy and he says that it gets “bristly” when dry, so he wets it throughout the game. And, he claims to wash it only once a month. To each his own, I guess.
Think of all the things we do to our hair. We wash it, cut it, comb it, brush it, color it, blow-dry it, feather it, shag it, curl it with a hot metal thing, tease it out, flatten it down, straighten it, braid it, shave it, and put all kinds of goop on it. We spend billions on tools and potions and concoctions for it. We pay people to care for it. What other body part gets as much attention? Hair is big business, for sure.
I was a fuzzy-headed, nearly bald, baby. It soon came in thick and lustrous, a smoky dark thatch of brown. At least, that’s the story I tell. I really don’t know what my hair looked like for the first years of my life. My brother and I had to have our heads buzzed regularly. Then, I’m not sure when, we were allowed to have enough hair to part and comb during the school year. But, we still had to get buzzed for several more summers. Our heads looked like smoky dark brown tennis balls.
I recall going to the barber shop, but I also remember my grandmother cutting our hair out in the yard. One time she nicked my ear with the clippers, so as an adult, I would occasionally tease her about dang near cutting off my ear while giving me a haircut.
When I was a young child, I remember my dad had thick, dark hair, enough to part and comb. He used Wildroot Hair Tonic on it. It sounds kind of strange, but I recall liking the smell of his pillow because of the Wildroot. At some point in his middle age, he decided to have it all cut off, and continued to do so for the rest of his life.
I could not say what my mother’s hair looked like in its natural state. I recently saw a picture of her from the 70s, I guess, and she had the large Loretta Lynn, Queen of Country Music hair from that era. Big, waved and curled, colored, puffed up and teased out, and held in place by tornado-strength hairspray. It seemed as though she was always doing something to her hair. Those home perms were the worst. I can still remember how horrible that stuff smelled. Oh my, it was bad. We lived in a very small trailer so the only way to get away from the stench was to go outside. Which was okay in the summer, but it was a problem in the winter when it was five degrees.
Like many men of my generation, I have gone through a couple of long hair phases. The first of which for me was in my 20s. As it got longer, it got kind of curly, so much so that I used a pick on it rather than a brush or a comb. Yes, that’s right, I had a ‘fro. A naturaI one. I thought it looked mighty fine, if I do say so myself.
But, it just got to be too much, so I had it cut off. And, I spent the next decades going to Supercuts every few months for a trim. “Off the ears, off the collar, thin it out on top.”
As guys get older, they like to tell stories about their athletic prowess, the cars they used to have, and the hair they used to have. I suppose I am no exception. However, unlike many of my contemporaries, my hair has not thinned out at all. My hairline has not retreated, I have no bald spots or any reason to comb over. Perhaps it is easy for me to say, given my head of gloriously thick, luxurious hair, but I would never wear a toupee or do a comb over. I would have it buzzed right down to the scalp, just as I did as a young lad. Just as my dad did in his later years. It seems kind of silly to wear a little hat made of hair to pretend you’re not bald.
Once in a while I would tell my wife about the long, thick, curly hair I used to have. I began to wonder what it would look like in my later years. So, I stopped cutting it. I went two years without a haircut.
As my hair grew longer and longer, I observed a curious phenomenon. People, mostly women, felt emboldened to comment on it. “Oh, what nice, thick hair you have!” Or “You know, women would pay a lot of money for hair like that.” But, the most intriguing thing was that women thought it was okay to make comments, and a few even asked to touch it, believe it or not. The remarks were mostly complimentary, but what if the situation was reversed? What if I made hair comments to women? And, asked to touch it? I would be thought of as a weirdo creep.
One comment I liked was when a gentleman quietly said to me, “You’re letting your freak flag fly.” Yes. Yes, I was. I was letting my freak flag fly. Thankfully, he did not ask to touch it.
Eventually, my hair grew beyond shoulder length! To my surprise, it was not as curly as it used to be, although it was thick and tended toward bushiness. And, at that length, if I’m being honest, it looked terrible. I did not realize that until I saw a picture. It was way too much of a good thing.
My wife suggested I go to her hair stylist. I showed the stylist a picture of George Harrison from the mid 70s and asked if she could do it like that. And that’s what she did. I thought it looked quite attractive. Unfortunately, it was still me underneath George’s hair.
Nowadays, I wear it longish most of the time, covering up my ears and collar. Sometimes I have it cut short, then I don’t go back for 6 or 8 months. I usually wait until my wife can’t stand it anymore and suggests it is time for a haircut. Then I wait a little longer. She doesn’t mind it being long, she does not like it to be bushy, or “fluffy”, to use her descriptive term.
Sadly, it is no longer a smoky dark brown. I don’t know if I can truthfully claim to be a “silver fox”. Probably “gray goat” would be more accurate. Aside from having it cut once in a while, and running a comb through it, there will be no altering it from its natural state. No perms, no dyes, none of that.
Ah, who cares anyway? It’s just hair, you know.
Looks terribly great to me.
Looks like you need a haircut. Pretty cute cat.