It was the night of June 23rd. Wind was blowing through my hair as I stood on my friend's porch; I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. There was a British breeze coming from the East. It smelled of fear and hope at the same time. A few minutes before, my phone had received an update that the United Kingdom had voted to leave the European Union. I knew that my life would never be the same.
The minute I walked back into the house, everyone started giving me strange looks. It almost seemed as if they had forgotten who I was, but then my friend punched me in the stomach. This was a good sign, as that is how we normally greet each other, though I couldn't shake the idea that something was amiss. Why had they been staring at me so strangely? At first I thought that they were disturbed that I was covered in pig's blood. But that couldn't have been the only reason; I mean, my friends looked quite disturbed.
And then I realized…it's my haircut. A few months ago, I returned from studying abroad in France and all of my friends were titillated to find that I had gotten a Euro cut. That's one of those haircuts wherein you shave the sides and back of your head and keep the top long; it's like a pretentious mullet. The people at the party must have heard about Britain's decision to leave the EU. They just must have!
The same thing happened the following day. I walked into my dentist's office with my Digimon face tattoo and everyone kept staring at me with Franco-German condescension. Those people didn't think I had the right to keep my European haircut. Well let me tell you something: they were wrong. Britain may have left the EU, but my hair will forever be in the EU. The friendships I made during study abroad and the lessons I learned will always be on top of my average-sized head. I've always been content with the size of my head but it wasn't until I got a Euro cut that I was truly able to appreciate the subtle contours at the back of my skull. People like my haircut but they don't respect its sovereignty. I'm conflicted.
Nigel Farage was able to notice that my facial structure goes well with a Euro cut; the angle of my downward sloping hair serves to accentuate my jawline and he knew it all along. Boris Johnson knows a thing or two about hair and he complimented me on my sick hair cut. He told me that I should never allow my choice of haircut to be dictated by the tyrants of mainland Europe and I couldn't agree more! Angela Merkel doesn't think I should've brought my haircut across the pond but she is not my mother. She has never been my mother. Even assuming that the multiverse theory is true, there is no conceivable universe in which anyone slightly resembling her could be anything resembling a mother figure to me.
It's been a rough few days for people with haircuts like mine. None of you with American haircuts will ever be able to fully understand what it's like to have a European haircut during the Brexit. None of you. The day the UK leaves the European Union, I won't change my haircut. I will never bow down to anyone but myself and the winners of Survivor. Don't tread on me.
