I've really run the gamut of lengths with my hair.
When I was little, I had hair down to my hips. It was straight, a nondescript wheat-brown. My mom liked to do it back in all sorts of braids and clips and ponytails with little fake flowers on them.
In middle school, I went through a leather-wearing, punk-music listening, misanthropic goth-girl phase. I wanted to dye my hair black, much to my parents' dismay. They relented at my pleas for "emo" bangs--which, at the hands of an incompetent stylist, turned out looking like a half-baked bowl-cut. I loved them.
When I was midway through high-school, I went redhead and never looked back. I decided to grow my hair out shortly afterwards--I thought long red hair, down to my waist, would go so perfectly with my fluffy sweaters and shiny cat earrings. I got it to my mid-back by college.
So imagine everyone's surprise last week when I came home with all my hair shorn off.
I had my reasons besides aesthetics for going short: I felt stuck in my life, for one, and for me, that's always come with the need to do something drastic to my hair. There's a reason I keep temporary blue dye stashed in the back of my cabinet.
If you're still on the fence about a pixie cut, here are a few things I've noticed within my first week of sporting my short do.
1. You can't just roll out of bed and go.
With my long hair, if I woke up late, I could simply throw it in a ponytail and run. My short hair isn't so forgiving. Day-to-day, it requires less care, sure; normally all I'll do is put some water and volumizing cream in it and scrub my hand around. But if you don't even touch it, every single cowlick or ruffle you have is painfully visible. The good news is that you can pass that off as a style if you want, unlike with long hair.
2. You can look awesome short, regardless of your face shape.
Most guys have short hair, and stylists never tell them they'll look bad with it. Why should they say that to you? What this phrase means is that you won't look like the traditional soft, welcoming picture of femininity. There's nothing wrong with that image at all, but you just need to be aware that your short hair will not fit. If you're really worried about "looking bad," do your research into different types of pixie cuts. You'll find that there's a lot of versatility with bangs, texture and styling.
3. You'll turn heads.
Yep. I get far more looks on the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities campus than I did with my long, red hair. Not the bad kind, like I'm being judged, but more of the "Wow, that's different" kind of stare. I stick out from the sea of long Minnesota-brown locks. Your grandmother will definitely have something to say about your new 'do, but what you do with this conspicuousness is up to you.
Personally, though, I feel like a badass.
4. Your hair will not be happy with you for the first few days.
Get ready for a war on peace, my friend. if you had long hair for years like I did, your hair isn't going to be used to the lack of weight and a new part. You'll need to wrestle it into shape for a while. It's been a week, and I've still got one mutinous lock that refuses to stay put. You'll develop a close friendship with your hairspray.
5. Styling gets simpler.
You don't have a ton of variety for style once you chop it, so there's no more agonizing about how to do your hair in the morning. It's a step into the bathroom, fluff it up with some product and go. That's it. It's a fail-safe, always-look-good sort of deal that doesn't involve lots of hand-eye coordination.
If you're sick of a bunch of hair falling in your face and wish your hair life was a lot simpler, then a pixie cut might be for you-- but only if you're comfortable sticking out in a crowd. You'll save a lot of money on ponytails!
And at the end of the day, hair grows back. If you've been thinking about cutting it all off for a while now, why not take the plunge and go for it?
