Gimme A Head With Hair

Hair.  I think it’s safe to say that at one point or another each of us has/had some.  As we all know, eventually, aforementioned hair has to be cut.  Maybe because people keep commenting on what a pretty little girl your son is, and he is, by the way.  Maybe your high and tight turned into a low and loose.  Or perhaps it’s just the one thing you have control over since that bastard broke up with you. Maybe you’ve been mistaken for Bill Golden?  What’s worse, you don’t even know who that is. Our first haircuts are not our personal choice.  They are at the behest of our keepers, parents if you will.  The general time frame for that first trim is in the first 3-4 years of life, unless you’re my cousin Heather whose first haircut came just shy of her eleventh birthday. No, not really.  She was eight.  Eight and four months. For my eldest child’s first haircut, I had a full bag of Tropical Starburst at the ready and a fully charged iPod so he could play Angry Birds to distract him.  He was three.  After I saw the pictures of his birthday party and wondered why Justin Guarini was wearing my son’s football jersey, I knew it was about that time.  Afterwards, he looked a lot older. CAUTION: just because they look older does not mean they will act older. My second child’s haircut is looming in the near future as his resemblance to Shirley Temple becomes more and more prevalent. At times, one may find him or herself on the receiving end of a bad haircut.  Then what?  You could find a different stylist/barber to fix the feature that is making you look like the lead singer of The Cure.  Or, if you have the cojones, you can leave it, make it work, and tell people it’s exactly the way you told them you wanted it.  It’s so avant garde. What happens when you don’t realize that you have actually been follicularly massacred?  Is it even worse when everyone knows but you? No, and I’ll tell you why.  Because as long as you like it, you probably aren’t aware of the fact that other people think you look like half a Flock of Seagulls.  I know this from experience, though I did not rock the Flock. I was trying to remember if I had ever gotten a bad haircut  and I simply could not think of one.  Then I remembered the ‘do of middle school.  Sadly, it was my choice and I liked it, but I might as well have been wearing flannel and kissing girls.  What was my mother thinking when she approved this haircut? Well, Nonnie?  What say you? It did grow out as all hair will.  The only time I was unhappy with a haircut was when stylist lady did not listen to what I said I wanted as I pointed to the accompanying picture.  What I got instead was her version of said haircut.  Never again.  Oh, how I cried.  It wasn’t BAD, per se, but it wasn’t what I wanted.  It was what SHE wanted. Employment listings for stylists should include the sentence “Control freaks need not apply.” How do I avoid bad haircuts now?  I avoid ALL haircuts.  Completely eliminates risk.  Sure, I can’t dance without my hair getting caught between my elbow and waist, but it’s worth it, I think. Then there are those that only wish they HAD enough hair for a haircut, even a bad one. No, I haven’t had much (conscious) experience in the area of the bad haircut. Boy, could I tell you about bad dye jobs, though!