Hair Update 1

A full week and two days have passed since I shaved all my hair off and it has been growing back rather nicely.

Here are some of the perks of the shaved head life:

1.  Super quick showers (because who needs shampoo?)
2. Minimal/ Unnoticeable shedding (the hairbrush hairball is no more!)
3. Low maintenance (no bad hair days, nothing to tie back, nothing to snag in chairs, zippers, glasses...kind of like the cape-less superhero life that Edna Mode endorses)
4. The fuzziness (the growing hairs are soft and fuzzy...as long as you go with the grain)

As it grows longer, my hair is losing its Velcro-like qualities. The "longer" hair also helps with heat retention so my head isn't as cold when it feels that passing breeze of A/C. In terms of personal impressions of my life post-shave, I feel simultaneously trendier and more demure. Removing my hair has made me more aware of my physicality and how I express myself through what I wear. I used hair styling to help define my look and express mood, wakefulness and formality. Hair does a lot to create a general silhouette and proportion the body. Now that my hair has been minimized, I feel more acutely how my wardrobe affects the kind of visual impression I make. A part of me feels more pressured, as well as more confident, to be "more fashionable," as if to justify the "artistic" decision to shave my head, while the more practical side of me just wants to make sure my proportions aren't off.

Along with feeling more conscious about my clothing, I am much less aware of my hair. I don't feel any different as myself, having a shaved head, and only notice the difference when I look at myself in the mirror or when someone comments on it. As mentioned before, it's extremely low-maintenance; so I don't have to worry if my part looks weird or if I have hairs sticking awkwardly out of a bun or if a braid has gone awry. The amount of attention I used to spend maintaining my hair is now diverted elsewhere, which is kind of nice in the moments I realize, "oh, I haven't been worrying about my hair."The decreased attention to hair plus my wearing head scarves from time to time sometimes makes me feel a bit demure. Multiple cultures implement some sort of head-covering to imply humility or modesty. I guess I get some feeling of that with removing the distractions of hair styling and the occasional head scarf covering.

Examining my impressions of my shaved head exemplifies one of the many ways my physical appearance impacts my perception of myself and of how others view me. We'll see how they change as I let my hair continue to grow out. My guess is that once it gets to about an inch, I'll start looking like a Korean middle-school boy. Oh, the joys of short hair. :)

What I Did With My Hair

Today I finally packaged my many mini ponytails to donate to Pantene Beautiful Lengths. Even though my hair was just past shoulder length, most of it measured past the required 8 inches; perks of a close cut, I suppose.

This will be the third donation I've sent to Pantene Beautiful Lengths. Whoo!

Timelapse

Couldn't come to The Buzz? Wish you could have witnessed the greatest shaving event of my lifetime? Well, weep no more and watch this time lapse of the whole shebang!
All credits and many thanks given to Daniel Pinelli.

Important highlights to look out for:

1. The asymmetrical, K-pop-esque hair cut
2. The 1-inch length shave (which everyone proceeds to pet)
3. The mohawk + remnant side part
4. The side shave designs
5. The removal of the mohawk (if you watch closely, you'll catch the various emoticons that take shape on top of my head. At one point, a goatee is involved)
6. The fledgling wings (thanks, mom...)
7. The shaving cream maccaroons (perhaps one of the only times my head will smell like a newly shaved beard)

Please, enjoy!

Reactions

Day 3 after The Buzz has come and gone and the reactions I've received have all been quite positive. Granted, I was still in the college environment where one may witness braided dreads, a pink frosted mohawk, and a half-shaved look walk by on separate occasions while people-watching for a couple minutes in the dining hall.

In pure shaved-head form, I have been said to resemble a Tibetan Buddhist nun, an airbender and, most recently, a lightbulb, courtesy of my ever-flattering and loving mother.

Tibetan Buddhist nuns

Aang

Lightbulb

I am thankful for the supporting feedback various people have given me. General complements have included remarks that the look works for me (and my personality), that I have a shapely head (which my mother readily takes credit for), and that I'm a little crazy but brave. The most common questions I've been asked are "Why?" and something along the lines of "How did your parents react?". I suspect that an overarching assumption is that my drastic hair styling decision was partially a move of rebellion against authority; a young adult declaration that I am my own being of human! I have fun describing how my parents made the first cut of hair and how my dad took care of wielding shaving cream and razor to ensure a clean-shaven scalp.

At this point, my hair has grown back enough that it feels kind of fuzzy. I haven't felt any more or less like myself since I shaved all my hair off, but I do have a tendency to rub the top of my head frequently because of how interesting it feels. The longer the hair grows out of my scalp, the more my hair line is accentuated; perhaps the only time my "sideburns" will be noticeable. Another characteristic my hair has developed besides the fuzziness, is its increased Velcro powers. I can now wear a beanie without fear of someone snatching it off my head. Why? Because no matter how hard I yank the beanie, the hairs are just long enough to keep it firmly in place. Beanie theft prevention tactic #53: Shave your head.

Tomorrow I may wake up with enhanced fuzziness and beanie-wearing abilities. Who knows what other power-ups my growing hair may hold?

Handkerchiefs and Velcro

My head is kind of like Velcro. In trying to tie various configurations of head scarves, I quickly discovered that the fabric would catch on the minimal hairs poking up from my scalp. As smooth as my head looks post-shave, it feels more like a gentle sandpaper.

Because the sandpapery Velcro-like state of my head, I figured that if I tied a handkerchief around my head first and then placed whatever else on top, adjustments could be made much more easily. Currently I've got a "100% silk" green to blue ombre Gap handkerchief (one that my mother graciously bought for me for $1.00 after noticing a middle-school me eye it longingly at the check-out line) tied underneath a beanie I wear to keep my head warm as I sleep.

Fast forward to the next morning, post brunch and I sit on a stone wall in the shade of a wonderfully warm May day. I woke up this morning to see my hair had visibly grown from when I last saw it, an estimated one millimeter! (probably still shorter than that) Regardless, the silky smoothness of my scalp is slowly becoming a dome of prickliness, the multitude of hairs springing up like a forest landscape composed of only tree trunks and no branches. Soon enough, I'll either have to layer handkerchiefs to keep the Velcro effect at bay or artfully manage the snagging hairs.

The Buzz

Today (5/2/15) I got all my hair shaved off. 
Having been born with a full head of hair, I have never been effectively bald until today. 
A tumble of whimsical curls grew into a thick bunch of relentless straightness, which my mother tried to tame with a variety of hair styles, ranging from bangs to curly perms to bobs. From what I recall, the history of my hair was rather experimental in elementary school. Then the excitement factor of my hair reached a plateau in my years of adolescence as I settled into the groove of hair norms. 

Though I let my hair grow out naturally with hair cuts here and there, I think I had a developing streak of daring in me. Sophomore year in high school, I cut 13 inches of hair into a short bob that ended at the bottom of my ears; pretty short for me but still within the boundaries of "normal". Sophomore year of college I entertained the idea of getting a pixie cut, but ended up growing my hair out to the longest it's ever been. So, naturally, this year I decided to shave it all off.

Sometime in April I proclaimed my growing fancy to my friends, discussed the implied craziness, thought about my reasons and the practicalities. For about a month, I let the idea settle in my mind and, despite some of the surrounding doubt, it flourished into conviction. The possibility of shaving all my hair off grew even stronger as I got the okay from my summer intern supervisor and my parents.

With only finals week between me and a cleanly shaven head, I metaphorically sat myself down and thought through why exactly I wanted to shave my head. I wanted to do it because I simply just wanted to; now was the time as I was in college and had one more year to go before having to search for a job. I wanted to do it because I had stopped myself from getting pixie cut last year; something about girls being more attractive with long hair, which is sort of silly but very much real life. And I wanted to do it as a personal social experiment; an examination of how people who knew me and didn't know me would react to me and treat me differently due to my physical appearance.

So far I have no regrets. I sit on my bed with a beanie on my newly shaven head not out of shame but because my head is cold. Turns out that once all the hair on one's head is gone, the scalp is exposed to sensations of wind and air it has never been privy to, thus, even the slightest breeze makes it feel cold. I've learned that my scalp feels like skin (woah, what?) and, as long as you don't go against the grain of my hair, it feels like one continuous forehead (or neck, depending on what perspective you would like to take). I've also learned that I have a few moles, a birthmark at the back of my head, and a tan line where my side part used to be. The rest of my scalp is shockingly pale with a sheen of greyish blue due to the my densely packed hair follicles. I'm looking forward to watching how the state of my scalp transforms over the next couple of months. 

I've started this blog in order to chronicle my thoughts on the shaved-head life and the various reactions I garner in my day-to-day life. As the informal social experiment this is, I figured I should have some sort of record to keep me accountable to being in the observational mindset. So, here it is!

I will admit that I probably would not have been able to make this decision so confidently without the immense social support I received from my parents and friends. I have been so blessed, so incredibly blessed to have friends who care and love for me well, who will laugh with me (and laugh at me in healthy portions...sometimes I need the humility...or pronunciation help), and who will still be my friends regardless of the state of my hair. I am thankful for my parents for their gracious and loving support, always coming with a good dosage of humor. 

Thank you, dear friends, near and afar, for each of your words of encouragement and acceptance. Thank you, Mom and Dad, for loving me through all the peculiar and exciting ways I have come into my own. And Thank you, Lord, for all your bountiful blessings and goodness to me.