| MOP HEAD - Part 5 by The Bard |
| And that was it. I had crossed the boundary between restrained and the outrageous, the conventional and the exceptional, the ordinary and the magnificent. I just let my hair grow. Within a year, it had reached my knees and had retained all of the thickness and condition of before. Mark had, by then overcome his shyness and took a passionate interest in its progress and its care, helping me enthusiastically with the increasing burden of washing, drying and brushing. This shared project brought us together, and added a new intensity to our lovemaking. Two years after we met, we became engaged to be married. By then, I began to have some doubts about growing my hair much longer. It was now to the tops of my calves and still growing at about an inch a month (Mark had measured it � my mother�s hairdresser was exaggerating � a little!). I almost never wore it loose outside of our apartment, at most venturing a knee length braid. It was also still so thick. In a single braid my hair was as thick as a man�s wrist at the top, and not much less at the ends. It was increasingly difficult to put my hair in a bun in a way that didn�t itself attract attention. Sensing my unease, Mark became an expert in making a tighter, more compact bun than I could ever achieve by myself. In the end I decided to continue to keep growing my hair until our wedding day, which was in just under a year�s time. After that, I told Mark, we would decide on our favourite length and stick with it. Although I sensed Mark wanted me to keep growing my hair forever, he never once tried to persuade me against my choice. �Your hair is so wonderful�, he once said, �I wouldn�t mind if it never grew another inch�. We were married the next spring. I wore my hair in two thick, simple braids falling in front of my shoulders to well below my knees. With my straightforward white dress, and a coronet of flowers I looked like a medieval princess � a Lady Guinevere of the modern age! It truly was a magical day. Mark�s eyes filled with tears of joy as he watched me walk down the aisle. After a dreamy honeymoon in the Caribbean we returned to our flat in dreary London. After a few weeks, when our lives had returned back to earth, I raised, over dinner one evening, the question of when I should cut my hair and by how much. I think Mark was secretly hoping that I had forgotten about it and he joined in the discussion with some reluctance. By this stage my hair was effectively ankle length - perhaps three to four inches off the floor. It was still growing at the same breakneck pace and still showed little sign of losing its remarkable thickness. We talked about our favourite length. Mark (predictably) said he liked it best as it was. I had a preference for just below knee length � it felt more like a coat and less like a dressing gown! In the end, we settled for mid calf length � a classic compromise. |