On the female psyche and hair

After looking at some old wedding photos today belonging to some women that I know, I realized that the length of a woman's hair can often identify her position, age, and stage in life. While this is no great preponderance, it struck me significantly today.

It seems to me, that in their younger years (usually through high school), most girls seek to grow their hair out long. And then, as if a rite of passage, the summer before she heads off for college, one cuts it short (shoulder or chin length). Whether this is merely a convenience factor or a sign that she is putting away childish ways, I cannot guess. Halfway through college if a young lady has met a gentleman of her liking, she begins to grow her hair back out again, not so much for the gentleman as for the wedding pictures that she has already envisioned, though they are not engaged. And so a couple of years later, her glorious crown spills all around her shoulders, beautifully offset by bridal white, forever captured on film. In the early years of marriage, one maintains the mane (after all it was a lot of work to grow it out), only to find it's much more trouble than it's worth. And so as career or childbirth and motherhood quickly carry a woman into a new phase, so her hair also finds a new phase and place in the world. Her hair is cut short, most likely shorter than it ever has been before in order to accommodate her busy lifestyle. With many women it seems to get shorter and shorter as the years go by until we end up with the blue hair styled weekly or biweekly by some beauty school student who accidentally occasionally turns it purple.

The years march by, styles fade and return, and our hair line moves up and down. Split ends, perms, and color treatments mark the years and stages of our lives. And regardless of our inevitable purple-haired fate, we must remember one thing... at least we choose to change the length of our hair (and possibly the color). Many of our poor male counterparts are faced with not having that choice at all. And for this I am eternally grateful.