Friday, July 22, 2016

My Father Hated The Way I Grew My Hair as a Teenager


I finished High School 39 years ago, in my high school graduation picture I have nearly shoulder length curly wavy hair, mutton-chop sideburns, and a cheesy mustache.  My father hated it.  He thought it looked silly.  It was very much the style of young men of the time.  His mother, my grandmother told stories on my father.  When he was a teenager she would give him 25-cents and send him off on a Saturday afternoon to get a "proper gentleman's haircut."  He would get a 5-cent buzz cut and use the other 20-cents to see a movie.  She urged me to ignore his complaints and I did.  As I have grown older, the hair styles of young men have varied widely, sometimes looking a bit silly.  I remind myself that my father thought my hair looked silly.  Unique hair styles are part of being young, thinking the styles are silly is part of being old.  I try not to think old.  Express yourself.

Sorry Mitchell, I had this posting scheduled before I saw your posting yesterday.

7 comments:

  1. not every guy can pull off a man bun. there are 2 guys at my gym that can and they look good.

    I have an issue with all the tats the young people get. but to each his/her own, I guess.

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  2. Dang whippersnappers...get off my lawn!!!

    :-)

    -Andy

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  3. My father hated hair and always forced me to keep mine as short as possible. I looked like a frickin convict. After I got out of high school I turned hippie and let my hair grow. And I never looked back.

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  4. Ones such as the photo remind me of RiffRaff during the closing scene of Rocky Horror Picture Show.

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  5. Yes, express yourself! In high school and much of college, my hair was beyond my shoulders. My father never said I word (just another thing for him to find disgusting about me, I think), but it drove my mother crazy. She constantly complained. I was 18 when my sister got married and my mother only allowed one photo of me to be taken at the wedding. Last year, she was telling her friends that I used to have such long beautiful hair. She "never wanted [me] to cut it." She loves rewriting history. What, no photo from high school?!?!?!

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  6. I had the mutton chops; my grandmother hated them. I showed her a picture of Franz-Josef, who had enormous Victorian sideburns, much fluffier than mine. He was emperor of Austria when she was a girl, and she had devotion toward him till the day she died - at age 108. I pointed out Franz-Josef's sideburns, to which she said: "That different; he was emperor. You be emperor, you look like that." It was hard to win an argument with grandma.

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  7. I have "convict" hair which my Mother hated. She said " but you have such nice wavy hair. " I go for low maintenance hair. Never did the "helmut" look of the 70's with hair half over my ears and NEVER had the long, girly hair. Also eschewed the grease in the hair and went dry long before it was fashionable, and a by the way, a bun style hair style on a man looks just silly. The only thing worse is the "rattail" poneytail of an old, gray haired bald man. To each his own. Another cliche, " whatever floats your boat."
    Ron

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