I am not as handsome.
I am overdue for a haircut.
I come from a generation that considered long hair much more than just a fashion statement. It was a clear defining mark of who you were and what you believed in. All my teen life I fought with my parents, unsuccessfully, to get my hair to the length I thought it should be. Just when I got it got to be good in the back I was marched off the barber shop.
No fancy hair stylist for me. I went to the same guy who gave me a scundy when I was 11 years old.
If your hair was too short you were a straight or worse yet a nark and even though I could have stepped over mounds of drugs and not known what they were I certainly didn’t want to appear uncool.
And so it was that my graduation picture from High school shows me with white sidewalls and not much on top.
When I left to go to the big city for college of course the first two things I did was let my hair go without any scissors action and to grow a beard.
When I returned home my Mom had added long hair and a beard to the graduation picture.
Nowadays I am only too glad to keep my hair short. In fact wish I had the testicular fortitude to just shave it all off. It’s a pain in the rear to take care of when it gets too long and wearing headphones or windy days make me look like a rooster.
I am ashamed to admit that a few years back I actually had my hair colored. The occasion was my Daughters wedding and I thought I would impress the ex-wife and her kin with my youthful appearance.
It was a disaster.
I went, on the recommendation of one of our sales staff to what I was assured was the best such place to have it done. My hair is normally mouse colored these days. A little brownish blondish but mostly grey. The hair folks gave me a treatment, I went home and looked in the mirror and saw Bozo the clown looking back.
It wasn’t just reddish. It was hunter blaze orange.
I looked like a traffic cone. I went back to the salon and they frowned at me and tried again. This time I looked like the famous red headed step child.
Needless to say I am not a big fan of hair coloring. I guess I earned the grey so I will keep it. And unless I miss my guess I didn’t make too much of an impression on the ex.
The big lesson of course was, to not care.
-30-
Go back to today’s Blog post for 2/19/11
