In the past couple of days, I’ve become aware of an important paradigm shift in my life. Are you ready for this?
My hair is long.
I realize that this might sound slightly ridiculous to you. Because, relatively speaking, my hair hasn’t been short since about second grade. But it used to be really long. Like, below-my-hips long. And it was long-long for quite a while. In fact, it was pretty much my most distinguishable feature for most of my childhood/teenage years/early 20s. It wasn’t unusual for someone who didn’t know my name to refer to me as the girl with the hair. And that’s pretty much who I was, in some ways. I was the girl with the hair that was twice as thick and way more than twice as long as most other girls’ hair. It made a love braid (or couple of braids). In fact, I only really miss the length when I braid it, because it was just so nice. And heavy. Like a rope used to moor a boat. I also sometimes miss it when I have bare arms or have forgotten a scarf, because it was good for covering up and keeping warm, like an always-attached shawl.
But don’t want it to be epically long again, really. I cut it off during my senior year in college. I was ready for a change, and it had started to give me head and neck aches, and I had begun to see it as a general nuisance. So I took off 11 1/2 inches and donated it to Locks of Love, and spent a couple of weeks adjusting to my short hair (which was just past my shoulders). And though I’ve tended to keep it a little longer than that, I’ve always thought of it as short, because perceptions are relative.
So when I found myself thinking that my hair was kind of long yesterday, it was kind of a shock. I’m not sure when it happened, but somehow my personal worldview has altered. And my hair is now long. Well, longish. Let’s not get carried away.
