Hair: Much More Than a 1970's Musical

I grew up primarily in the 1970s, by anyone's standards a cool era of disco, bell bottoms, macrame plant hangers. . .and the Brady Bunch.  I only mention the Brady Bunch because of Marsha's hair.  It was the coolest do around for a girl.  Dirty blonde, iron-flat, thin, longish, and somewhat lanky, it was the hair everyone wanted.  (If you watch reruns of the show you notice immediately that Jan's hair is much nicer than Marsha's:  clean blonde, thick, with a gentle wave, and very long.  Go figure!)  When I look at pictures of myself at around age 8 and 9 (1975 and 76), I see a skinny, tan girl with Marsha Brady hair. The unbrushed version, certainly, but nonetheless a desirable look.  My mother, however, found the unbrushed and stringy quality of my long hair frustrating.  I concede that it was all my fault - I almost never pulled a comb through the stuff and it was constantly hanging in my eyes.  My mother gave me an ultimatum - keep it tidy or get it cut.

You can guess the upshot of this command; an appointment for a haircut was scheduled after a couple of weeks of my continually stringy, uncombed hair.  I wasn't happy about this at all since I liked my long hair and it was the fashion, but I took it philosophically, telling my mother that I was agreeable to a haircut as long as I could get what was called a "long shag."  I found myself excited to be sitting in the salon chair, confidently instructing the stylish in the proportions of the "long shag."  When my explanation was finished, I recall seeing my mother lean over and whisper something to the stylist and I had a faint notion of coming tragedy, which I ignored.  A few minutes later, I sat frozen and stunned in the twirling chair as foot-long hanks of my hair fell to the floor.  I didn't have quite enough sense to flee, just enough to sit there while my Marsha Brady hair was being transformed into Bobby Brady hair.

The new haircut was not only shockingly out of fashion, but made me, the tallest girl in the 4th grade, look even taller, my skinny neck like a Tootsie-Pop stick with straw stuck to the candy on top.  I vowed to myself that I would grow my hair back, no matter what, until I had achieved a proper Marsha Brady look once again.  I felt, somehow, that the long hair (even at its stringiest) was part of an identity that I had lost and wanted back.  My obsession with long hair found expression at my grandmother's house the next summer during vacation.  A door-to-door water softener salesman had left a coloring book advertisement with my grandparents.  One two page spread presented the following:  page one, a pretty girl with long, flowing hair and the caption "Her hair should have been her crowning glory;"  page two, the same girl with a long, frazzely mop and the caption "But hardwater shampoos told a different story."

I was captivated by the comparison.  I fetched the box of crayons and went to work.  Dealing with the frazzled mop hair was easy - I just X'd out her whole head in dark, black crayon.  My next task was to complete coloring the long, flowing hair on the previous picture.  I don't know how long it actually took me, but it felt like hours of selecting just the right shades of lemon and butter, adding streaks of honey and sunshine until the hair was a luscious concoction of blonde beauty.  The picture was the expression of what I felt I had lost and what I was determined to have again.

Unfortunately, the 80s bi-level years took their toll and it wasn't until I was in my 20s that my hair finally reached past my shoulder blades.  However, once it was long, something in me felt whole, felt vindicated. No matter how many helpful stylists suggested a shorter cut, I always maintained a strict "no more than two inches" approach to haircuts. My long hair was ME!  In fact, it was more than me.  It was my shield, my facade, the "cover" of the "book of me."  I received every compliment about my looks with the same rejoinder:  "Oh, it's just the hair!"  My hair was a way to both attract and repel attention, which I found incredibly handy as I've always been made very uncomfortable with attention to my physical looks.

As you might imagine, the thought of losing my hair was a hard part of my cancer diagnosis.  I have always worried about getting cancer, especially since there is a lot of cancer in my family.  I always felt that watching my hair fall out would be the worst part of the disease.  Instead, losing what I thought was so large a part of my identity has been a blessing in disguise.  Two good friends, Spencer and Summer, a couple in my LDS ward, offered to arrange for, and provide, a wig made from my own hair.  The offer was so generous, so kind, and so unexpected that it imbued me with courage and made me feel loved in a way I never have felt before.  Jenny, another friend, got together with Summer to organize a  "Hat Shower" fundraiser to both raise money for the expensive wig and to help me get a collection of hats to wear when I lost my hair.  Many, many friends and family members attended the shower with generous donations for the wig and beautiful hats and scarves for me.  My friend September, a talented stylist, volunteered her services to cut and prep my hair for the wig maker.  When we learned that a wig requires three heads of hair, my friends Aimee and September offered their own hair to make up the difference. This, even though each of them had the most gorgeous, long, flowing locks seen since Lady Godiva. When my hair started falling out in earnest, my husband Jeff spent an hour cutting my remaining hair and then buzzing it close to my scalp, all while telling me that I was still beautiful to him.

Losing my hair, instead of stripping me of identity, has reminded me where my real value lies - in the relationships I have built with other people.  Accepting help when I felt ugly and scarred has opened my eyes to what real beauty is - it's kindness, compassion, and generosity of spirit.  The world may tell us that something as fleeting as hair can be our "crowning glory" but in reality our glory comes from giving and receiving love within the human relationships we cherish!