I woke up this morning and had a brief second of intense panic before I remembered what had happened yesterday. After 10 years of wearing my hair long, I had had the whole thing chopped off. Unceremoniously, as if the decade we had spent together meant nothing to me. A few snip-snip-snips, then it was gone. Then some more snips, for shape and texture. Then some crackling foil, for color. And suddenly I wasn’t quite sure who the dude in the glass was.
The tail itself is still with me, in a sweaty ziplock. I don’t know whether I’m keeping it for sentimentality’s sake, or because I’m hoping I can one day reattach it, like a finger that’s been hewn off in some freak accident. The back of my neck feels weird. Hell, my entire head feels weird, what with the weight of 8 inches of thick, unwieldy hair suddenly gone. I look at my odd collection of hair elastics now with a kind of strange revulsion.
Ten years ago I was an incoming junior in college. I didn’t smoke yet, and barely drank. Barely knew anything about websites. Had only had one girlfriend. Hadn’t worked a day in my life, really. If I think about all the things that have changed since then, it astounds me how the only thing that seemed to remain the same was the ponytail. Through three more years of college, two relationships, three career changes, two startups, an acquisition, and a whole bunch of smaller u-turns and hard lefts. A decade of circuitous life.
And now, here we are.
The back of my neck feels cold.
