My Life Story as Hair

I gave my creative writing students a prompt today, and I wrote with them.

"Tell me your life story in incidents involving your hair."

I am eight. By some act of God, my mother lets me choose my hairstyle. Since I am more boy than most of the boys in my class, I opt for long in the back with a spike on top. My sides are shaped into soft points, the top of my head is thick, lush, brown spikes. A little on the longish side. The back is straight and hangs down past my shoulders. I can’t stop looking at myself in the mirror. After I get the haircut, we go to the mall and I am undoubtedly the coolest kid there. I go to the arcade with my brother, and he’s embarrassed by me, but likes when I watch him play Mortal Kombat and cheer him on. “Watch me rip this guy’s spine out, Lu.” I want to be just like him. I would do anything to have been born a boy.

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I am fifteen. My hair is often in a ponytail because I am one of the starting five on the JV basketball team and we do nothing but win all year. My hair is thick, darkly honeyed, and long, but I have these shaggy bangs that hang in my eyes. And I have no style. That year, I will finally give up and grow out my bangs. Instantly, I am better-looking and, for the first time, have hair my friends can’t stop touching. “Jennifer Aniston hair!’ they all squeal when I walk to my locker that morning at school. I spend the rest of the year in the back of the neighbor boy’s LTD, which is mostly fun. I look at some of my friends from other schools and think, if I were a boy, I’d totally date her.

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I am twenty-two. I’ve got mostly good hair now, but since I’ve always liked big, big hair, it just emphasizes my fat face. Looking back at pictures now confirms this. For years, I will carry around a driver’s license with a huge face and even bigger hair. Still, I spend a lot of time on my hair—I have my first girlfriend and want to look good for her. Things in my life are weird; I am constantly scared, uncomfortable, defensive, and insecure. And grad school is about to start.

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I am twenty-six. I am 73 pounds lighter than four years ago. I have another degree and I teach. I secretly hope that one of my students will comment on my evals, “she’s a good teacher, but her hair is awesome.” Lately, I’m into Aussie hair products, but that will change; I am ridiculously fickle. My life is no longer weird; it’s domestic and busy, and I am content to stay home next to this girl I love. Though I am still defensive, I no longer let insecurity overwhelm me. I don’t take credit for my hair anymore—it’s from my mom, I say. She’s got a mop of thick, stick-straight hair, and I am only lucky that I got it.