Several months ago, the guy who constantly sneaks into my bathroom to
use my skin-care products announced that he had plans for a new project.
"I am," he revealed dramatically, "going to let my hair grow for ONE
CALENDAR YEAR!"
Jessica Burgess
Clearly Unedited
We all need goals. But why couldn't his goal be something normal, like
running a marathon or terraforming the moon?
But I strive to be a Supportive Girlfriend. So I swallowed my
trepidation, smiled and patted his soon-to-be-unruly head.
So his hair grew. And grew. Soon, with the dark mop atop his head, he
looked like Steve Nash might, if Steve Nash were 5-10, weighed 140
pounds, and stood a high likelihood of getting noogies from the other
basketball players.
Pretty soon, my boyfriend looked – and I am being charitable here –
awful. But I wouldn't say a word against his important new project. In
fact, sometimes he would catch me staring at him, and he would say, "Do
you think I should get my hair cut?"
On the inside, I would scream: "FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT'S HOLY, YES!
YES! CUT THAT MESS AND LET ME LIVE AGAIN!" But on the outside, in my
role as Supportive Girlfriend, I would smile beatifically and say: "I
have no opinion on the matter. It's your hair."
But thank God, last week he said, "I've been thinking about cutting my –
" Then he said no more beyond a surprised squawk, because I had yanked
him by the arm into the car.
After burning rubber to the closest shopping center and parking
illegally outside a salon, I shoved him toward a stylist and sat down in
the waiting area with a magazine. It was confusing to discover that Tom
Cruise and Nicole Kidman are still married, until I realized that the
magazine I had picked up was a little dated.
Pretty soon he was done. I was delighted with his hair, which was mostly
short except for floppy bangs. But he looked quite disgruntled.
"I look like Hitler," he said.
"No you don't," I said, lying. He did look sort of like Hitler.
Now he is grumpy, and saying he should have just left his hair long.
On the bright side, noogies are probably the last thing someone who
looks like Hitler has to worry about.
Jessica is a latent control freak. E-mail her for advice on how to
run your life at jburgess@quickdfw.com.
