Friday afternoon

Well, since the blog entry earlier this morning, I called my friend H - who had offered her hair stylist to me to cut my hair off - and H was able to get me an appointment today. So I had my hair cut off. The stylist suggested that rather than shave my head entirely, I leave a little hair. She's done this for other cancer patients, so I trusted her advice. So now I have what is essentially a buzz cut. David said it's like what he got when he joined the Coast Guard. It feels funny, and probably looks funnier. But at least there is some hair up there still. Better than having it fall out in clumps which it was starting to do. Of course H and the stylist complimented me -on the shape of my head, my nice hair line, my small ears, etc. etc. and I guess it doesn't look terrible - my ears don't stick out, my head doesn't appear to have any obvious deformities (bumps, flat places, etc.). But it feels pretty drastic. I wonder how long it will take to get used to it. Probably about the time the fuzz that is left begins to fall out, I'll have gotten use to the fuzz.

I continue to find it so interesting what I am learning about myself. My general approach to my hair for years, decades, has been to have something that is "easy" to deal with. This summer I cut it shorter than I had had it cut since I was in middle school, a true "short" haircut, and I had just begun to get used to that and even like it. But still, there was hair up there. I could feel it on my ears. I could feel it on the back of my neck. On my forehead. I could reach up and touch it with my fingers. And it was like a fence or a wall, a kind of shelter - something to cover me and support me. Without it, I feel so exposed. My face, my self is just sitting out there in the open. Scary. All of which reminds me of a poem I wrote back in high school - which I've always liked (and remembered). In memory of my lost hair I'm going to include it here:

HOUSE OF HAIR

I live inside a house of hair
and no one knows I"m hiding there.
Like golden strands of silken hay,
I do not brush the hair away
that covers my face. Alone, afraid
I stay inside the world I've made.
I see out, they don't see in,
I am behind a wall of thin,
shaking shining strands of hair,
and no one knows I'm hiding there.

Bye hair.
Peace.