Insert hair-related pun here.

Long hair was more than just a style to me.

It was a way of life.

No, just kidding. But in all seriousness, I can't even begin to fathom why I ever chose to have long hair. It's one of those things that you don't really begin to think about until you're over with, like being in a hurricane or committing arson.

I'm not going to lie about it anymore. I was aiming to adopt the image of a viking, getting ready to wage a deadly war against 11th century Britain.  Sadly, I didn't posses nearly enough facial hair, muscle, or throwing axes to successfully pass myself off as a viking. Long hair was as far as I was going, evidently.

Some people said I looked like a girl. Let me ask you, then; does this manly visage to the right side of your internet browser look anything like a girl to you?

I thought not. Maybe being a viking does lie entirely in the facial hair.

Seriously, now. I thought myself to be something I wasn't. I thought that long hair meant something else. I thought I looked like a valiant hero or a dreamy hunk with long blond locks flowing over my shoulders like a fuzzy scarf. I was told I looked a lot more like Cousin It than anything else.

In  the end, it was all about apathy. I wasn't striving to be different, I wasn't trying to set myself apart. It was simply because I didn't care. I didn't care what other people thought, I didn't care that I looked like a girl. And plus, my neck was pleasantly warm all year around.

The question still probably remains in your mind: Why did I decide to cut it? Why did I decide to throw away the years of waiting? The reason for cutting it was the exact same reason for not cutting it: I just didn't care. I really didn't care, after a point, what length my hair was at. I just decided I was ready for a change.

When I said I didn't care what my hair looked like just now, yeah. That was a lie. There was only one style I was vehemently opposed to: the buzz cut. I'm not ripping people with buzz cuts, but really, now. I don't want my head to look like a delightfully round slightly fuzzy peach. There's also the tendency for buzz cuts to appear predominantly on jocks. If you happen to be in the buzz cut minority, and you are, in fact, not a jock, I apologize, but unless you have some sort of fetish for peaches, there's no excuse.

Eventually, I decided that I just wanted a medium-length hair cut. I actually had no real measure of what medium was; I had not changed my hair style since elementary school, so long was long and that was it. I still don't know if my hair is short or medium, but I'm happy with it

. Although I no longer appear to be a viking, I'm more confident that I look at least a little bit more acceptable. After I came back to school post-haircut, I got compliments from people I didn't even know the name of. Girls just turned to me and said, "Nice haircut" or, "I like your hair." Girls. Real ones. I knew for a fact I did something right.

And that's why I'm still happy with my current hair. I may be a viking no longer, but I'm happy.

I can be contacted at thatmartykid@gmail.com. Don't expect me to reply, though. That's asking too much.