following the social experiment

I wanted to give a bit of an update on the shaved head thing.

For those of you who don't know, I shaved my head a few weeks ago.

I love it. It's incredibly convenient, I think it brings out my facial features and forces people to look at the ME behind the "style", and it's fun. I don't have to think about things before I do them - like putting on a pullover or jumping in a pond - I can just DO and not worry so much about whether or not I'll mess up my hair.

Before this, I didn't realize how much I was concerned about messing up my hair. Now I realize when I put on a hoodie I would have to think about it, go slowly, be careful not to mess up my do. Now I just throw it on and go. No more worries about ruining a look. The look is pretty much permanent. I am hoping that having so little hair will really help me to do more things without worrying so much about how I look doing them. It's important. If I want to slide through mud puddles with my kids in the rain, I should do it. No hair in my face. No worrying about getting my hair muddy. And clothes? Well, that's why God made washing machines.

Anyway, the social part of the experiment is proving interesting. The most common comment I receive is: "Oh, I love your hair! How long are you keeping it that way?"

Strange. No matter how my hair has been cut in the past, no one has asked me how long I plan to keep it that way. When I respond with - "Well, I really like it, it'll probably be this way for awhile." they are sort of... shocked and awed. Sometimes not in such a positive way. Okay...mostly not in a positive way.

I'm not really sure what they're thinking when they ask how long I'll keep it that way, or if they mean it when they say they love the hair. Most people honestly seem genuine when they say they like it. I guess they just expect that it was a whim or I went slightly insane for awhile and the DO like it, but they expect I'll go back to the norm soon.

The thing is, I'm not very interested in the norm.

I've officially gotten over the strange looks I get in the grocery store and around the town. I am a little weired out by the small children who point and stare when I go into the women's restroom. I wonder if they think I'm a guy or if they are just taking in something they haven't seen before and trying to connect those neurons in their brains. Either way, I think, even though I feel self conscious about it, it's good for them to see something non-traditional. Personally, I want to expose my kid to as many different kinds of people as possible. God made some pretty interesting things, some pretty beautiful things. All different colors, shapes, and sizes. I wish more people would look at the beauty all around them and classify it as such, rather than classifying things they don't see everyday as strange.