Streamlining
I’ve been talking about shaving my hair for so long now that it feels like it would never happen…it’s like I’ve been snapping my fingers to your face to get your attention. I’m sorry, I have breasts; if I want your attention, I know how to get it.
Part of why I just keep talking about it, is because my blog sometimes serve as a written internal dialogue to myself. It’s like I’m debugging myself in writing. I get it out in the open for myself to peruse and inspect, poke at it a couple of times with a stick, and find a solution to what my problem is…god knows I have tons of issues, my bug list is off the chart.
Initially I wanted to get my hair chopped off because it was becoming too much of a pain in the ass, I feel like I was wasting quality time maintaining it. Then I hated the fact that my hair didn’t feel like hair due to many years of bleaching and dying, I missed my natural hair. I thought it would be nice to just cut it real short…then I thought why not just shave all off? Then I got scared. I was scared of shaving my hair. I was afraid that it would leave me less pretty. That pissed me the hell off. I have a problem with my being afraid of something like not having my hair. I felt that I was trivializing what I feel like I have to offer the world (like my fine ass). I guess I was questioning how I see my self worth.
I set a date with my best friend for the shave a short while back but chickened out at the last minute because I was deathly afraid of freaking my mom out. Of course a small part of me was freaking out. Since then, day by day, little by little, my various fears have been eating away at me until I have to turn around and kick it in the nuts. It’s simply not me to let things gnaw at me forever.
So I got off my ass and told my mom about the haircutting thing and warned her it would be less than half an inch long. I set another date to cut my hair with Brian. I told him I wanted to do it this weekend. Then I got that last minute permit to climb Mount St. Helens, so I figured I could go climb that in the morning and get my hair cut that night. I figured a nice long solo hike would allow me to clear my head and give me a chance to rethink this whole excess hair removal process. I tried to make sure I wasn’t doing this as a self dare…in other words, I gave myself the option to not go for it if I had any doubt in my mind. I had the three hours drive each way to and from the volcano and the six hours hike to do some thinking. In the end, I felt that if anything, my hair cut was long overdue and I just really wanted it off.
I got back to Seattle around 7…met up with Brian at 10. Being my best friend and all, he didn’t try to talk me into or out of anything, he simply chatted with me to make sure I knew what I was doing and that I really wanted it done. He had all sorts of shaving stuff out. We discussed how close of a shave I wanted. He warned me that because I had gotten so tanned, if I shaved it too close to the skin, my super white scalp might create too much of a contrast…not to mention in his experience he always liked the one week after a close shave look more. So we decided he was going to go through my hair with his various beard trimmer accessories…going shorter as we go, until we find the length that I liked.
We drank some wine. I tied my hair up, braided it, cinched it again and off it went. I was oddly not nervous the whole time. We both knew there’s the possibility that it could go bad…that Brian could be consoling me at the end of the night. Hell, I even told him, if it goes badly, instead of going out for beer, he’ll go fetch it, and we’ll order pizza and be happy. It all turned out well. With the interim cuts and pictures, I know my hair will grow out well. There were various points where I was looking pixie-ish and I could have stopped with a cute cut, but I wanted my hair shaved at least for a moment. In the end, we stopped at about quarter inch. I’ve got this funny tan line at where my braided hair parts but…I like my hair short.
We went out for beer afterward while I sat around and massaged my scalp all night. So good…holy cows…the wind in my scalp…I’m so streamlined. And without my further ado because I love you all:
Part of why I just keep talking about it, is because my blog sometimes serve as a written internal dialogue to myself. It’s like I’m debugging myself in writing. I get it out in the open for myself to peruse and inspect, poke at it a couple of times with a stick, and find a solution to what my problem is…god knows I have tons of issues, my bug list is off the chart.
Initially I wanted to get my hair chopped off because it was becoming too much of a pain in the ass, I feel like I was wasting quality time maintaining it. Then I hated the fact that my hair didn’t feel like hair due to many years of bleaching and dying, I missed my natural hair. I thought it would be nice to just cut it real short…then I thought why not just shave all off? Then I got scared. I was scared of shaving my hair. I was afraid that it would leave me less pretty. That pissed me the hell off. I have a problem with my being afraid of something like not having my hair. I felt that I was trivializing what I feel like I have to offer the world (like my fine ass). I guess I was questioning how I see my self worth.I set a date with my best friend for the shave a short while back but chickened out at the last minute because I was deathly afraid of freaking my mom out. Of course a small part of me was freaking out. Since then, day by day, little by little, my various fears have been eating away at me until I have to turn around and kick it in the nuts. It’s simply not me to let things gnaw at me forever.
So I got off my ass and told my mom about the haircutting thing and warned her it would be less than half an inch long. I set another date to cut my hair with Brian. I told him I wanted to do it this weekend. Then I got that last minute permit to climb Mount St. Helens, so I figured I could go climb that in the morning and get my hair cut that night. I figured a nice long solo hike would allow me to clear my head and give me a chance to rethink this whole excess hair removal process. I tried to make sure I wasn’t doing this as a self dare…in other words, I gave myself the option to not go for it if I had any doubt in my mind. I had the three hours drive each way to and from the volcano and the six hours hike to do some thinking. In the end, I felt that if anything, my hair cut was long overdue and I just really wanted it off.
I got back to Seattle around 7…met up with Brian at 10. Being my best friend and all, he didn’t try to talk me into or out of anything, he simply chatted with me to make sure I knew what I was doing and that I really wanted it done. He had all sorts of shaving stuff out. We discussed how close of a shave I wanted. He warned me that because I had gotten so tanned, if I shaved it too close to the skin, my super white scalp might create too much of a contrast…not to mention in his experience he always liked the one week after a close shave look more. So we decided he was going to go through my hair with his various beard trimmer accessories…going shorter as we go, until we find the length that I liked.
We drank some wine. I tied my hair up, braided it, cinched it again and off it went. I was oddly not nervous the whole time. We both knew there’s the possibility that it could go bad…that Brian could be consoling me at the end of the night. Hell, I even told him, if it goes badly, instead of going out for beer, he’ll go fetch it, and we’ll order pizza and be happy. It all turned out well. With the interim cuts and pictures, I know my hair will grow out well. There were various points where I was looking pixie-ish and I could have stopped with a cute cut, but I wanted my hair shaved at least for a moment. In the end, we stopped at about quarter inch. I’ve got this funny tan line at where my braided hair parts but…I like my hair short.
We went out for beer afterward while I sat around and massaged my scalp all night. So good…holy cows…the wind in my scalp…I’m so streamlined. And without my further ado because I love you all:
posted by SteakGirl at 12:14 PM
1 Comments:
The first thing I noticed was the wind too. That and the sunburns, that there's some skin that hasn't seen much UV since shortly after you were born. Seriously, peeling scalp, fun to pick at when you're bored, but kinda gross.
Hey, and now (at least temporarily) you'll be the first to know it's raining!
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