Do you remember the mid-2000s nightmare doll called What’s Her Face? I say “nightmare” because she had a completely blank visage that you could draw features on, plus a selection of velcro wigs you could switch as you pleased, meaning when not in play she had a potato for a head. Horrific.
I had one and I loved her. I mean, what a gimmick. Didn’t like your eyes that day? Wipe them off and start again. Needed a new look? Pop off that green ponytail and try the pink fringe! Would that it were so easy in the real world, because I’ve been chasing the high of reinvention for about half my life.
I first cut my hair short at around 15. Up until that point, it had been one long, frizzy mass that I mostly kept back in a ponytail. I suspect I was directly inspired by my friend Kate, who had cut her similarly thick, curly hair into a choppy bob a few months prior. But lest you think it was a “cool” thing to do, it was not. In the heyday of the GHD? Please. Long, straight hair was the goal, and to actively work against that goal was tantamount to insanity.
For me, it was a (what I in retrospect see as a classic teenage) statement: I don’t fit into your little box, you pigs! I have SHORT hair. It’s DIFFERENT. I’m not like other girls. The problem was that I did want to be like other girls, but judging by the reception I got from my peers, I fell short. You can only have so many groups of lads looking at you like “It speaks?!” before you take drastic measures. Cutting off my hair was my way of getting out of that game altogether, the clearest possible message I could send. (It made sense at the time.)
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