The Grey Guff: III

I hate getting my haircut. At one time in my life I had that chore of a task minimised to just two or three times a year, but that left me looking pretty scruffy half of the time, so once every couple of months I find myself wandering into the nearest barbers to get the ol' barnet trimmed.

It's nothing to do with vanity or fear that he or she will do a bad job, nothing to do with having to put up with most hairdresser's woeful attempts at conversation. My problem with getting my haircut is this; It forces me into a situation where I must stare at myself, for a substantial amount of time. It is that one time where I think about who I am, what I've done, where I'm going.

Of course, on the majority of occasions, and I would imagine for the majority of people, this is not a daunting prospect. In fact, I would imagine that it would take a certain amount of coincidence and 'perfect timing' for this experience to be a negative one. But in being as self-analytical as I am, the time spent staring at myself has been in the past quite damaging. Before me I have seen, not a man mundanely monitoring the progress of his haircut, but a man realizing that there are things about himself that he is not entirely happy with.

The fact is, the reflection, the person I see has taken on many faces over the years, each time it seemed he had changed, re-evaluated what was important to him, and perhaps he was becoming someone he did not want to see in that mirror. It could be a hard image to look at.

In years gone by, the hair grew long. This year, my mullet has been well & regularly shorn, and I think that is a reflection in itself on how happy I am (one person in particular to thank for that).