For the last few weeks we’ve had one quarrel with Jackie. Hair. And her stubbornness to not keep it out of her face. After a lovely bob she got last year around this time, her bangs grew thickly all the way bellow her jaw. We’ve been pondering a new style, a fresh haircut, while keeping the length of hair.
We’ve mentioned a short haircut as a consequence to her not keeping her hair out of her face. Daddy said he can get the buzzer and do it himself. In this context, Conrad and I have discussed our difference of opinions often. He loves short hair. But I like Jackie’s long beautiful locks. Today her and I had a heated discussion about her unexplainable stubbornness to let her hair flow freely, because it gets into the food, she can’t see where she’s going, and she started tilting her head constantly, to see.
After a lovely morning, playing with friends, hair in a ponytail, we had lunch and she reluctantly went down for a nap. I insisted on it because we were supposed to go to a ballet class late this afternoon.
I could hear her shuffling in bed, talking to herself, to her dolls. Eventually I decided to go up and rub her back and lay next to her. I was so exhausted and so ready to rest. As I got up to her bed, she was pretending to be asleep. She felt my gaze. She started smiling. Then she sat up. I got near her and only then I noticed something was off. She had chopped off her hair. And inch long in the front.
- What did you do? I ask.
- I cut my hair. Do you like it? she answered smiling.
- Why did you do it?
- So daddy wouldn’t cut it shorter.
- Jackie, we go to the salon to get nice haircuts.
- But you’ve cut my bangs in the past!
- I did. But I could measure and see what I was doing.
- I think it’s nice. She says.
- How did you manage? I ask.
- I pushed the laundry basket near the sink to reach the scissors and I did it.
- But why?
- So I wouldn’t have hair in my face.
At this point I called Conrad. He came. Her bedsheets had pieces of hair so I switched the bedding. The bathroom, the sink and trash were draped with long strings of blond hair. Lots and lots of it. I couldn’t quite see how bad it was. But it looked really chopped. And the front was so short.
She kept trying to convince us it was a great idea. I was so tired, after she went to the bathroom to change her clothes, I burst into tears. She heard me. Then she burst into tears. Conrad was trying to keep us together with a calm soothing voice. He even told her it looked nice. Why was I so affected by this? I honestly still don’t know. I’ve told her to never cut her own hair when once I saw her reach for the scissors and then reaching to almost cut her bangs. We were brushing her teeth. We had a talk about it then. I guess she forgot.
After we went to the salon, and the lady there did a pretty good job blending in the chopping, and fixing the layers, we got home and Jackie went to her room, glanced at herself in the hexagonal mirror on the wall next to her play kitchen and said: “why did I cut my bangs? I didn’t have a strong enough will.” (Strong will just like in the Frog and Toad story about biscuits). I was passing by so I asked her why she said that. She assured me that she likes her new haircut, and maybe in the fall she can do it again. “Noooo!” We went over it again. “If you want to get a haircut, please tell mommy!” I told her she did a good job layering. I was surprised actually. To which she said she saw a video on YouTube the other day, with her cousin, on how to cut hair at home.
I don’t know if I should laugh or cry. But honestly I did not see it coming: her chopping her own beautiful hair. It will grow back, I know, and we can already laugh it off, but only after shedding some tears over chopped hair.