becoming // it's personal

a while ago i shared about shaving my head and have since shared a bit more about what it meant to me. it's time for an update, people.

obviously my hair is not long. however, after being nearly-bald the two inches i've grown now make me feel like rapunzel up there. i've had to increase my shampoo rations from dime to nickel-sized blobs- girl grows up.

i went through this period between cutting my hair super-short and eventually buzzing it off where every 2 weeks i would start attacking my hair. the 2 week interval wasn't planned, it was just around that point where i would get really anxious and act out with scissors. i probably should have been heavily medicated (what did they do with britney when she went psychotic bald?) but what the hell, i was finding myself. there is so much energy in our hair, and as i cut it off the first time i felt like chains were literally falling off my body and i was maybe going to float away. after i shaved it i finally realized that's why i'd kept attacking it- i hadn't really done the deal. since then i've only slightly trimmed it but for the most part i've left it alone.

i feel like i'm growing with my hair. this week the faux hawk came down, and i may or may not have had moist eyes ("moist"- ew/cringe) - see, ever since i cut it off, my hair hasn't been about what i look like. it's been about defense. it's been about vulnerability. it's been about discovery.

anyway, i've pretty consistently had a bit of a spike (minus the bald period), this is what it's been about: "KEEP AWAY! just give me a REASON and i will grind your pathetic face in gravel and then KILL you (accompanied by jerky hand gestures to emphasize the significant words like "gravel" and "kill" and show you how tough i am not)."

that makes me sound mean. in a way, i've been a bit bristly (although in comparison to the meek and mousy version of myself while i was a raging codependent, i'm gonna seem that way regardless). i guess you can kind of compare it to an injured bunny that morphed into a rabid pitbull someone just stabbed.

you get the picture:

me before = bunny
me during intense trauma therapy = rabid animal
me finally coming into myself = hungry bear awakening from hibernation?

i like the comparison of me to a bear. those beasts are cra and by cra i mean amazing. they're known for being deadly protective of the babies, but they don't go around raging at the world all the time to prove they're capable of ripping out a trachea or popping a couple of lungs after opening some wretch's chest. they know they can take care of themselves if need be, so for the most part they just ramble around enjoying grass and berries or whatever, playing in rivers, being awesome. plus, nobody messes with a bear. not even lions. well maybe lions, if they lived on the same terrain (but i make up they could hold their own in that hypothetical situation).

so if you've caught the drift of my metaphor, this is the part where i say goodbye to my spiky hair and hello to whatever it grows into next- like me. goodbye old heart-hurts, hello possibility. i can be a ranting raging foam-spitting lunatic if i need to be, but no sense in acting like a wounded animal when all really is well, 'cause i'm not anymore.

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