Scissors

I am a long hair girl, my hair hasn't been above my shoulders since my freshman year of high school. This is partly because, well, I have a pumpkin head and short hair makes me look like a jack-o-lantern. I think the other reason I grew my hair long was because "boys like long hair."

And now, I don't know what to do with it. I should add that my morning routine involves only a hairbrush-- I don't blow it dry, or use products. So, I don't have that many layers because it would require upkeep that I just can't seem to get into doing. (My college roomates would all get up two hours earlier to get their hair perfect, and I would sleep and sleep, and then a messy ponytail would get me through the day). But now, I've had long hair for more then a decade, and most of the time I pull it back and I spend the whole summer hating its spongelike qualities.

It would be INSANE for me to do something drastic to my hair in the next 5 days, and then get on a plane and have a million and one pictures of me with some ridiculous haircut. However. I am bored of the way that I look. I am in a rut. A decade long rut apparently. (I can't really get over the fact that a decade is only my adult life, no high school overlap). I don't want to put highlights in it really, I've never really colored it and to tell the truth I like the natural red and blonde that works its way into my brown hair. But cutting it?

It is a security blanket. I think I won't be pretty with shorter hair. I think I look immature with my hair halfway to my ass. I also think it makes me look vulnerable, there have been studies that show that women with long hair are more likely to be attacked then women with shorter hair. I really don't want a mom haircut.

There should be a great hair oracle. All the women in the world would make the yearly pilgrimage and kneel before a shadowy figure backlit enough to show off some fantastic highlights, and a voice would boom "I told you it would make you look like a skunk," and then the poor woman with the misguided hair would weep and throw herself on the oracle's mercy. Sooner or later the oracle would relent and say "Listen, all you need to do is even out the color near the back, and get gentler layers. It will be fine really."