Gender and Hair

[brigid]

Mirrored from Words, words, words, art..

If you follow me on twitter (and why wouldn’t you follow me on twitter?), then you probably already know that I buzzed most of my hair. I left the fringe but the rest is about 1/2 an inch long, very Riot Grrl I guess, pretty dated maybe, but oh my gosssshhhhh I’m so much cooler than I used to be. Hair is hot and hair is heavy and now when there’s a breeze it goes straight to my scalp and neck instead of getting lost in my hair first. It’s pretty awesome.

I’ve spent most of my life with very long hair. I cut it around my senior year of high school and since then have been going back and forth, growing my hair to its longest length (waist length) and then cutting it relatively short again… usually chin length or so.

I was what some people would term a tender headed child. I had long, very fine, very dry, hair and it snarled and knotted constantly. Combing/brushing it was constant agony. Keeping my hair in braids or buns might have helped, but very fine dry hair is also slippery and it would escape. Detangling spray would also help but I don’t think it existed then. So I complained a whole bunch and my mom finally gave in and cut off all my hair.

She might have been pregnant at the time. I’m unsure of the timeline. But I know she stopped hand crafting delicate little girl gowns out of satin and lace, complete with frilly aprons and bloomers, around the time my brother was born. And I started wearing hand me down clothing from my older male cousins. With very short hair.

It.

Was.

Awesome.

Unisex clothing was very much a thing in the early 80s (I was born in 1979), and it wasn’t as uncommon then for little girls to wear clothing that wasn’t pink and plastered with butterflies. But the combo of “obviously” little boy clothing (including a totally bitchin’ pair of yellow canvas shorts with a million loops and tabs and a clip on compass that I called my safari shorts) and short hair meant that suddenly strangers treated me very, very differently.

Suddenly I was “sport” and “tiger” and strange adult men would comment on how big, strong, brave, handsome I was. They’d ruffle my hair and give me candy. People don’t frown and narrow their eyes or make comments when I scrambled around and climbed on things and yelled.

It was amazing.

Eventually my hair grew out again and my mom forbade me cutting it again and I was encouraged both explicitly and implicitly to be more feminine. To dress a certain way, and act a certain way, and talk a certain way, and maintain certain interests while dropping others, and to wear my hair long.

My hair’s short again, shorter than it’s been since that very first hair cut, and I adore it. I probably won’t keep it this short forever– I get bored and like to change things up– but I’ll be keeping it for a while. It feels very liberating.

Related Articles:

• Gender and Hair
• It’ll last longer
• Dove wants your money and will tell you what you want to hear
• Ladymags
• My Body, Myself

Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.

Comments

[al_zorra]

O yeah!

I minked my hair in my mid twenties and life was very different ....

But I was young then, and nothing like that actually mattered.

Hair -- fortunately, if one wants to be kinda of snarky -- is always a problem, and not only for females. el V's best friend went mostly bald within a few months in his early twenties. el V himself is dealing with -- well, he lucked out -- the most gorgeous silver and iron grey hair, that cut very short is very butch, very kewel and sexy. Knowing him as long as I have, it's really the best hair he's ever had, but before yielding to my pressure to let it go and be what it was, he was in A State.

And I still have no grey, and still as bright blonde as ever -- and what WILL I DO WHEN THAT CHANGES? One thing I will not do is go red.

Hair -- it matters. So happy thoughts for your joy in letting in the air into your hair!

[untonuggan]

BUZZ CUTS for the win!

[kayote]

I really wish I knew what my hair would do if I were to cut it short.

If it was mostly straight with a slight wave like it was when I was younger, I would probably sell my hair and chop it.

If it keeps the corkscrew curls and frizziness it now has.....*shudder*. That would not be awesome. Cutting my hair and then having to spend MORE time on it to make it look professional would be counterproductive!

So, for now, bunning it. I like the bun. I'm amazed I just decided to put it up in a bun and figured out how. And it stays. Out of my way, off my neck, but not able to point in all directions (too much).