“It’s not that bad.”
I’m standing in my bathroom in front of a sink filled with hair. My voice is desperate. Shannon, the friend who lent me the hair scissors, doesn’t say anything.
The ends are okay, but the bangs are choppy and flat. It looks horrible. Instead of the face framing layers I was imagining, I have lifeless locks falling forward. Shannon takes a picture and I smile despite myself.
“This is exactly how I thought it was gonna go,” Shannon says. She cut her own hair several weeks ago, only to end up at a salon fixing ragged ends. I ignored her every warning as I planned my own chop.
“It’s not that bad,” I say again with a panicked laugh. I hate being wrong and I hate admitting to mistakes. For some stupid reason, I thought a few how-to videos would make me infalible. I’d even been trying to convince my roommate Elizabeth to let me trim her hair.
“Maybe if I just-” I say as I lift the scissors to my hair again.
Shannon bats my hand away from my face. “No. No more cutting.”
As the consequences of my actions stare at me head on in the mirror, I cast my mind around for some solution, a way to fix it, anything. It’s akin to the feeling of getting caught in a lie as a child, when I would search for a way to worm myself out of big trouble. It comes to me when I glance at the shower in the corner.
I hadn’t washed my naturally wavy hair in several days, making the texture flat and straight. In a last ditch effort to save my pride, I dunk my head under cold shower water. Shannon grabs towels from my room as I squeeze water through my hair. I dry off and rub in some leave-in conditioner to smooth it out and help the curls hold shape.
My hair still looks choppy, but now it’s wet. Shannon sighs and goes to the living room to work on her homework. I scrunch my new bangs, trying to decide on the best course of action. I settle on curling the bangs around my fingers and pinning them up with a few bobby pins in the hopes that they’ll dry in more defined curls. It’s a last ditch effort to save a do-or-die situation.
I head back to the living room. Shannon doesn’t hesitate to tell me that I look like I have horns.
I grab a plastic bag and stuff it with wads of hair to throw out. I sweep the floor and wipe down the sink, praying this doesn’t result in a clogged drain. I had lightened my hair over a year and a half ago, and most of that color goes straight into the garbage. Quite literally, it’s one hundred dollars down the drain.
Hair feels different when it’s made of cut up clumps no longer attached to your head. It feels coarser and fluffier. Like a scratchy rabbit.
It also feels like regret, if regret was a thing you could hold in your hands.
I curse myself for biting off more than I could chew. If I had just left well enough alone after I trimmed the ends, or better yet, never touched those scissors at all, I wouldn’t be mentally cataloging every hat I own right now. Stupid.
My mom calls as my hair dries. I don’t say a word about my hair, even as I google local salons between telling her about my recent exam. I know what she’ll say, and I don’t want to hear it. I research reviews and prices, weighing whether or not I am ready to accept defeat.
My hair is thick and takes nearly two hours to dry. The wait is agonizing, but I don’t want to risk causing extra frizz with the blow dryer. I try to get some homework done with little success. Shannon and I make donuts to pass the time.
I tap lightly at my hair, finally deciding it’s dry enough. Most of my dark brown hair looks fine, just about normal, if three and a half inches shorter.
My heart hammers in my chest as I take out the pins. These are some of the same bobby pins that held my hair up for prom, nearly three years ago. It feels like a lifetime. I had first cut my hair short in high school, at the start of senior year. It was a big chop of over a foot that took my hair from my hips to my shoulders. That was the most drastic change I had ever made to my hair, and I frequently cite it as one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
Of course, that cut was done by a stylist.
Back in the bathroom, my hair slowly unfurls from the twists. The bangs are still uneven, with one side thicker and longer than the other, but the refreshed curls give new life to my face. The jagged ends are hidden by the waves, which curl away from my face rather than towards it. It looks a lot better, but I’m still unsure.
Shannon seems surprised by how nice it looks and insists it’s okay. I can’t tell if she knows how upset I am and is trying to spare my feelings, or if my hair really does look alright. I still feel a little stunned by my own audacity, hesitate to hope that it might turn out okay.
Shannon declares that it’s time to take pictures. She came dressed and ready for a photoshoot, but I’m in an old t-shirt with no makeup on. As I get dressed Shannon digs through my products and insists I try a bold blue eyeshadow.
We talk and laugh about other things as Shannon works on my eyeshadow, but my mind always wanders back to my hair. Will it look okay tomorrow? Should I wash it more often? What products should I try? Are pictures really a good idea right now?
We move to my room and set up some fun colored lights for the photos. I try to rationalize and talk it out, working to convince us both that this wasn’t purely an act of impulsivity. And really, hair grows back rather quickly if you think about it.
“You’re so lucky,” Shannon laughs as she repostitions my hair for another picture. “You did something dumb, and you got lucky. Accept it.”
When I’ve had enough, Shannon and I switch roles and I start snapping photos of her, then take some of the two of us. It’s a lot of fun, and a great distraction. We settle back in the living room.
My roommate Gina munches on a donut and examines my face. She was in her room for most of the night, but popped out long enough to grab a Snapchat story of me snipping my hair. It led to several panicked texts from my friends, and false reassurances that were more for me than for them.
It’s strange to have someone stare at your new haircut. Their eyes search your face and flick from to side while you wait for their judgement. It’s almost an uncomfortable form of intimacy, like when it’s your birthday and everyone is singing and you’re not sure what to do with your hands. You just can’t look away. You want the truth, even if you’re a little scared to hear it.
After what feels like an age, but is probably no longer than ten seconds, Gina nods her approval. She looks at the pictures and gasps at the lighting, urging me to post one on Instagram. Gina, Shannon, and I settle into a conversation about all the other things college girls talk about. Internships, boys, astrology, our families.
The night passes quickly and Shannon heads home. I’m left in a quiet apartment with only one thing on my mind.
The next day I click through the pictures and stare into the mirror. I fluff up my hair, twist it, spin it, pull it behind my ears, and let it fall forward again. The bangs are just barely long enough to pull into a ponytail. The waves are still present, but are a bit flatter than they were the night before. It could be worse, but there’s no denying it could be better.
Elizabeth, who was at work the night before, examines my hair. She insists it looks fine, but she is now firmly refusing to let me trim her own ends. I relent that it’s probably for the best.
I go online and search how expensive curling irons and sponge rollers are and how long they would take to be delivered. I might need them to be comfortable being seen in public for the next few months. Yet I prefer a more low maintenance routine with my hair. Open tabs on my computer still show local salons. I search for similar stories of people who have cut their own hair. Most are from lockdown, when no one saw them for months on end. Jealousy nips at the back of my throat.
“Stop thinking about your hair,” Shannon texts me.
I head to work at the UHS physical therapy clinic. By now, the safety protocols are a predictable routine. I show the greeter my symptom survey check, then head upstairs to the clinic where I swap my cloth mask for a surgical one. The excess hand sanitizer and a dozen pairs of disposable latex gloves dry my hands out until they’re red and cracking. The sticky sweet smell of the cleaning products never really washes off my clothes.
My hair melts from my mind as I take temperatures and scrub exam tables. I make small talk with patients and therapists in between folding laundry and wiping down door handles. I only feel self-conscious once or twice, and later on realize no one commented on my hair at all. It’s both a disappointment and a relief.
I find myself wondering why I’m even worried about it at all.
When I get home, I clean a few stray hairs from the sink. I glance in the mirror again, giving my hair a light tug. I take a shower and revel in how easy it is to comb out the knots and how little conditioner I need to use. My hair feels so light and soft. It was a mistake, but it might be one I can live with.
I don’t buy the curling iron.
I call my mom again several days later. We chat for twenty minutes as I summon up some courage. I make her promise not to get mad, then reveal I’ve snipped off a good chunk of hair. I did it, not a stylist, in the middle of my bathroom. I even used fancy sharpened scissors.
She’s aghast, just as I expected, and asks what the fuck I was thinking. Picturing her shocked and worried face is too easy. My usual hairdresser is her best friend, and I know my mom is already planning to call her as soon as I hang up.
I send her pictures, good and bad. I reassure her that my hair isn’t a disaster, I really am okay with it, and I have absolutely learned my lesson. It was a fun experience that didn’t bring nearly as many regrets as it could have, but it’s probably best to leave hair scissors in the hands of professionals.
Julia Maher | February 18th-20th, 2021 | Ann Arbor, Michigan