Even before I came to the cherub program, a deep part of me yearned to have a near-bald experience. I felt a strange affinity for the close-cropped comic characters of Alison Bechdel, let pixie-cut inspo from Pinterest seep into my brain and, in the Prius on the way there, joked to my parents about getting a buzzcut the second I left their line of sight.
But the idea of walking into senior year looking like I spent the summer at a military camp instead of a journalism institute, especially after my unfortunate bowl cut in middle school, was just too intimidating. I figured I would wait until college to cut my hair… until being a cherub changed my perspective.
There, I didn’t need to worry about being judged while I learned how to style it. I had my own money, and Floyd’s 99 Barbershop was three blocks away. I watched the fabulously short-haired Meryl Streep of “The Devil Wears Prada” in the dorm basement and the voices got louder.
Worse yet, everybody was encouraging me. All my cherub friends were telling me I should take the plunge! I texted my parents hoping someone would make me back out, but — just my luck — those rotten scoundrels were completely supportive.
Finally, I had no choice. I made an appointment late one night and slunk into the barbershop the next afternoon. I still remember the feeling of clippers, inches from my neck, about to make the first big snip, and the hairstylist saying, “Once we’ve started, I can’t go back. Are you really ready for this?”
I wasn’t… but I decided to be.
I wobbled out of that building like a newly hatched penguin, if newly hatched penguins were known to palm the backs of their heads and giggle deliriously. When I got back for our 7 p.m. movie night, all the other cherubs hyped me up — and on the way, an older man at Colectivo told me I looked like a movie star.
No matter how much independence I usually had, being in a new place with new people removed any obligation I felt to cling to the status quo. I didn’t cut my hair back home because I thought it was too risky, that I should just “wait until college.” But the taste of adult freedom cherubs gave me made me realize that even when it’s hard and scary and unthinkable, you don’t need to wait until college to live according to your values, to be happy, to be yourself.
So… do I like it? Well, a normal haircut amount. I have to admit, it’s a little too short for my taste. (I never realized my head was so small before. When I put on a baseball cap, I look like a thumb.)
I know it’ll grow again. I know if I wait long enough, it’ll return to how it was before.
The thing is, though… I just don’t think I want it to.
That’s all.
