The Bob, Flower Power and Learning to love it

How it all happened: So finally, I decided to get a haircut. My hair were falling all over the place (a nightmare for our bai) and had turned dry and brittle. At times, frustrated, I wanted to shave them off and was only dissuaded by the fact that I’m a freak enough already. Anyway, off I went to this expensive “salon” for the haircut that would make heads turn…
When the stylist (couldn’t call her the parlourwali since she did some course in L’Oreal Paris) asked me if I’d like the ‘classic bob’ I didn’t think twice before consenting. I mean, Madame Beckham has it, Bipasha got it recently and according to my Sunday newspaper it is the “in” thing. For the next fifteen minutes I watched her chop long strands of my hair and tried not to cry. When it was done I suddenly realised that I was neither Posh nor Bips and neither did I have a posse of hairdressers to airbrush my hair every time I stepped out of the house. As she blow-dried my hair the haircut slowly came into being: my look had changed drastically and I wasn’t sure if I liked it. It wasn’t a bad haircut, it just wasn’t me!
Familia and the gang: Mom thought it looked great. Grandma thought I looked like a doll. Grandpa thought I looked younger. Dad thought it looked funny. Friends refused to say anything beyond, “You look so different”. Cousin thought I looked like a Hollywood actress of a bygone era. I thought I looked like Willy Wonka. Brother agreed but pointed out that he had longer hair.
Anger and Denial: I’ve had my share of disastrous haircuts (once a friend even remarked: What did you do to your hair?) but this would take months to grow! And as anybody who has just seen the face of adversity, I went into denial. This is just a bad dream, I told myself. I’m going to wake up with my tresses intact. Then came anger. Why couldn’t I have given it a second thought? Why, oh, why? But it was too late…
Fear: What will people think? That I’m a moron?
Acceptance: When there’s nothing you can do about something, you accept it. Yes, I had made a wrong choice. So what? I could always buy a nice hat and wear it until my hair grows back.
Learning to live with it: I have to live with it for the next few months. So I might as well learn to like it. What could be the upsides of the bob?
The bob has a long and fascinating history. It originated during the First World War when the womenfolk took to work in absence of the men who were at war. The bob was practical, easy to maintain and didn’t get in the way of work. And so it became the symbol of the liberated woman. Obviously, the men and the Church did not approve. You might not believe it, but I read somewhere that women wearing bobs were fired from work and were labelled as promiscuous. Times have changed now; the bob is more of fashion statement than a symbol of women’s lib. But I guess it is somewhat of a consolation to know that my disastrous haircut once represented “flower power”.
The next step to follow should be (ideally) learning to love it. I’ll come to it. As soon as I figure out how to flatten the Jimmy Hendrix-like halo of hair around my head.