Hair Gone

Lydia is 27 inches long at the 90 %, 16 pounds and 12 ounces 75% and her head is 16 5/8 inches in circumference reaching the quite perfect 50%. She was a trooper yesterday with her 5 shots and getting her ears pierced. It was fairly traumatic for all of us, including her pediatrician that is a veteran said it was rough. Lydia turned about the 7 shades darker than Bob the Tomato and bellowed so profoundly it shook us all to the core. Luckily it was all over in less than a minute and she happily napped most of the morning. Poor baby.


I have never been a real high maintenance person. I don't dry my hair unless it's cold or I have a cold or it's some sort of formal event. For awhile I was keeping a moderately stable length of hair just long enough to be thought of as long. My plan was to let it grow until the wedding and then I could cut few inches. During this time a good friend at work died of Leukemia (Still miss you Mo!) and just a few months earlier one of my advisee just 15 years old, Layla, also died of Leukemia. I am not very good at grief, not that many people are, but I decided that I would grow my hair and donate it to Locks of Love in their memory. I remember when Layla got her first wig how nervous she was and then when Mo got hers for her son's wedding. I thought it would be a nice tribute. It was something tangible that I could do in a terribly unexplainable sad moments. When I mentioned my plan to my hair dresser she confirmed some rumors that I had heard about the unreliability of Locks of Love. I was not going to just give my hair to some cheats especially since the thought of some corporate entity cheating cancer children may have killed Mo all over again. I held off cutting my hair until I found another nonprofit which I did; Wigs for Kids is my choice.

Honestly what may have begun as a seemingly altruistic intention is now just a necessity. My hair is long. It's ubiquitous. It's heavy. And it's got to go. At least for awhile. Luckily my hair is curly and it will need to be straightened to donate which should leave me with a length that may not be as shocking. If Lydia is 27 inches my hair is about as long. Thus today I cut my hair!