I remember the years of brown, thick, wavy, long heavy hair hanging below my buttocks. At 5'2" that was a lot of hair. After my second baby I decided it was time for the hair to be cut shorter and it was such a relief. To my surprise, I discovered I had wavy, unruly hair and not straight as I had thought. Now in my old age with white hair I choose comfort and convenience and wear it very short and natural.
Hello, You’ve brought back memories too. I also had long, thick hair as a child. I was very I’ll when I was 11 years old , a virus which attacked my liver and it was touch and go, whether I would survive. Luckily I did, but it was decided to cut my plaits off , as it was felt it took too much energy out of my recovery !!!!! 😂
Thank you for sharing this memory, Ruth. The idea that your extra long hair would take energy away from your healing has been on my mind since I read this. So grateful that you lived to tell this story of hair and survival !
I do have a question raised by your mention of the presence of peacocks on the estate at Corfu.
“The peace is occasionally interrupted by the unsettling squawk of peacocks, which roam the grounds freely. She once reportedly said that if she ever felt that she had landed in a place that she could not escape, she would immediately begin to hate it there. I wince at the available metaphor of flightless birds.”
It wasn’t clear to me if you were suggesting that peacocks are flightless? They are not strong fliers beyond a very short range but are, in fact, fully capable of flight. They regularly fly short distances to perch in trees during the day or, for the night, in trees or structures that offer some protection from predators.
The larger, interesting, question you raise concerns flightless birds. Despite any presumption of limitation or sadness we may feel about flightless birds, every species that evolved to flightlessness did so for very beneficial reasons. Penguins mastered “flight in water” and Ostriches mastered “flight via running” both to their great advantage.
The wince inducing flightlessness to which you might have referred was intentionally introduced by man; surgically removing the outermost section of wing on one or both wings (the section of wing and feathers critical for flight) would permanently ground birds. It is called pinioning. Pinioning was routinely done with swans on estates, for instance. Swans are excellent fliers and will migrate long distances within their wild range. It is in that instance I see a clear analogy to your “wince at the available metaphor of flightless birds.”
Wow thank you for this startling and fascinating clarification !! I did not know that flightlessness was introduced by man. You are quite right that this complicates the metaphor. But perhaps, in a productive way? “Flight in water” is such a beautiful image.
While true flightlessness did evolve naturally in many bird species, yes, the flightlessness that best fits your metaphor was totally created by man. There is another way to render birds flightless, or nearly so; again, this is a manmade result.
All birds molt their feathers at least once a year and those new flight feathers that have fully grown in can be carefully trimmed to limit flight. Until the bird goes through the next normal periodic shedding of old feathers, their ability to fly is compromised by that feather trim.
This was a fascinating read. Thank you for taking the time to do the research, and to write this thought provoking piece about hair. As a woman in my late seventies who lost my hair to a form of alopecia called frontal fibrosis alopecia in my mid-sixties, hair has created a difficult path for me as I dealt with losing one of my best features, a feature for which I had been known since my earliest days. My curls, my natural silver grey hair, and the styles in which I wore my hair always garnered comments and expressed envy from others. I wondered how I would ever show my face again in public when even my eyebrows fell out overnight. (I loved how my eyebrows looked.) Such vanity. Perhaps? Or, perhaps not. Hair was as tied up in my identity as much as anything else I could think of when it came to something I’d always been known for. Now, I shave my head, and find it freeing. Yet, deep down inside, I still long for for those days when I had the freedom of having hair on my head and didn’t have to decide whether to wear a wig to the pool or just dive in au natural. Hair remains a topic I find fascinating. It can a be a prison, but not having it is both freeing and limiting at the same time.
Hearing about the freedom you feel in shaving your head is just incredible. The way that hair holds such dichotomies is a constant source of wonder for me. Thank you so much for sharing your hair journey. It is always a privilege to hold these hair stories.
Thank you for this essay. I never thought to think of Elisabeth’s hair in that way.
I visited the palace in 1995 and became intrigued by Empress Elisabeth and bought a biography by Brigitte Hamann called “The Reluctant Empress--A Biography of Empress Elisabeth of Austria”. It’s fascinating and heartbreaking. The biography is a bit controversial because the author dives into what was making Elisabeth so unhappy and ill. I highly recommend it.
At 65, when so many women my age seem to be wearing their hair short, I’m letting mine grow, to see how long it can get. It’s thin and wavy/curly, so weight isn’t a problem. I wear it up to keep it out of the way; I let it down and braid it at night for sleeping, as my great-grandmother did.
Oh, thank you so much for this recommendation! I think I've read a bit of the controversy around this biography, but have never read it myself. I love that you are keeping a family hair tradition alive in growing yours out and maintaining it as your great-grandmother did. I am also growing my hair out and it has been a journey of patience and endurance!
Wow, an incredible image! I've been collecting so many stories from folks lately about their mother's expectations of their hair. There's really something in that! Do you still have these hair books? It reminds me almost of Victorian hair-wreaths: a sort of family tree of hair.
I loved reading this, so interesting and detailed . I never thought reading about the power of hair could be so entertaining and informative . So Thankyou for posting this. I am also an artist, essentially a textile artist, so I would also be very interested discovering what you do in your creative world as well as you writing.
Thank you so much for this, Ruth! It really means a lot. Currently working on some pieces based on hair and will gladly keep y'all updated. So look forward to future conversations here!
Haha, I'm so glad! Maybe we watched the same one?! 'The Empress' on Netflix ? They did not focus on her hair nearly as much as I was hoping :) Maybe in future seasons?
I am so happy your substack appeared in my reads this weekend! What a fascinating look at Empress Sisi and the symbolism and substance of her hair. It gave me pause to think about my own motivations for letting my hair grow longer than it has ever been. Soon to be turning 60, I have the Jan Brady look. (I'd say Marcia Brady but the middle daughter is more befitting of me in actuality.) With the encouragement of my son, I have let blonde locks yield to the emerging grays and white tones. My son likens it to silver and gold, reminding me of my value.
I think I am letting it grow and transform in color to explore the crone energy...a symbol of wisdom perhaps. I'm about to embark on my summer gig as head lighthouse keeper on an offshore lighthouse. On station my hair gets a pony tail and a baseball cap. Occasionally I don a hard hat. My mantra is lighthouse hair, don't care. I keep it simple out there.
I'm excited to now be subscribing to your substack!
Hi! I just found your Substack. Very interesting that you write about hair! As a black woman with long dreadlocks that I have been growing them for 14 years, my hair is emblematic of my spiritual journey and self-love. It also gets me a lot of attention, and is a huge part of how other people identify me, which varies depending on where I travel to, and what they associate with locs.
I wrote a memoir about my loc journey, called "Wisdom Tree: My 10 Year Journey with freeform locs". Maybe you'd find it interesting-I linked you to an excerpt. If you'd ever like to collaborate in some way, let me know. I'd be interested to speak with you.
Hey welcome !! I am thrilled to learn about your memoir and how it is centered on your hair journey ! Thank you for sharing--I loved how you refer to your locs as "Sacred Antennae" in this piece. So powerful and true. The way hair becomes extra-sensory of the world around us. What you mention too about how hair holds both this undeniable expressive outward-facing power and yet is often treated as a "public" site that others feel comfortable mapping their own views upon is such an important split that hair can hold: the public and the private in a single space. I would love to hear more about your travels with your hair. I'm so glad you came across HAIR CLUB--I'd be delighted to continue the conversation.
Hey Suzanne, thank you so much for taking the time to read an excerpt of my memoir. I'm so happy what I've shared resonated with you-and yes, these are themes I deal with, daily-trust me haha! Definitely living it out. I'm glad I came across your blog, too-Substack definitely needs to highlight more diverse and unconventional authors. If you'd ever like to message me, my IG is @haus.of.isis. Still getting my contact form on my website to work properly 😅
Yes ! Claim that power. Thank you for sharing 🙌
Hi
Hello and welcome!
I remember the years of brown, thick, wavy, long heavy hair hanging below my buttocks. At 5'2" that was a lot of hair. After my second baby I decided it was time for the hair to be cut shorter and it was such a relief. To my surprise, I discovered I had wavy, unruly hair and not straight as I had thought. Now in my old age with white hair I choose comfort and convenience and wear it very short and natural.
Wow, what a fantastic hair journey ! Incredible how cutting our hair sometimes brings with it a lightness even beyond the physical.
It's been fun, especially having hair of every color imaginable.
Hello, You’ve brought back memories too. I also had long, thick hair as a child. I was very I’ll when I was 11 years old , a virus which attacked my liver and it was touch and go, whether I would survive. Luckily I did, but it was decided to cut my plaits off , as it was felt it took too much energy out of my recovery !!!!! 😂
Thank you for sharing this memory, Ruth. The idea that your extra long hair would take energy away from your healing has been on my mind since I read this. So grateful that you lived to tell this story of hair and survival !
A very interesting and engaging essay. Thank you.
I do have a question raised by your mention of the presence of peacocks on the estate at Corfu.
“The peace is occasionally interrupted by the unsettling squawk of peacocks, which roam the grounds freely. She once reportedly said that if she ever felt that she had landed in a place that she could not escape, she would immediately begin to hate it there. I wince at the available metaphor of flightless birds.”
It wasn’t clear to me if you were suggesting that peacocks are flightless? They are not strong fliers beyond a very short range but are, in fact, fully capable of flight. They regularly fly short distances to perch in trees during the day or, for the night, in trees or structures that offer some protection from predators.
The larger, interesting, question you raise concerns flightless birds. Despite any presumption of limitation or sadness we may feel about flightless birds, every species that evolved to flightlessness did so for very beneficial reasons. Penguins mastered “flight in water” and Ostriches mastered “flight via running” both to their great advantage.
The wince inducing flightlessness to which you might have referred was intentionally introduced by man; surgically removing the outermost section of wing on one or both wings (the section of wing and feathers critical for flight) would permanently ground birds. It is called pinioning. Pinioning was routinely done with swans on estates, for instance. Swans are excellent fliers and will migrate long distances within their wild range. It is in that instance I see a clear analogy to your “wince at the available metaphor of flightless birds.”
Wow thank you for this startling and fascinating clarification !! I did not know that flightlessness was introduced by man. You are quite right that this complicates the metaphor. But perhaps, in a productive way? “Flight in water” is such a beautiful image.
Thank you for your thoughtful reply, Suzanne.
While true flightlessness did evolve naturally in many bird species, yes, the flightlessness that best fits your metaphor was totally created by man. There is another way to render birds flightless, or nearly so; again, this is a manmade result.
All birds molt their feathers at least once a year and those new flight feathers that have fully grown in can be carefully trimmed to limit flight. Until the bird goes through the next normal periodic shedding of old feathers, their ability to fly is compromised by that feather trim.
This was a fascinating read. Thank you for taking the time to do the research, and to write this thought provoking piece about hair. As a woman in my late seventies who lost my hair to a form of alopecia called frontal fibrosis alopecia in my mid-sixties, hair has created a difficult path for me as I dealt with losing one of my best features, a feature for which I had been known since my earliest days. My curls, my natural silver grey hair, and the styles in which I wore my hair always garnered comments and expressed envy from others. I wondered how I would ever show my face again in public when even my eyebrows fell out overnight. (I loved how my eyebrows looked.) Such vanity. Perhaps? Or, perhaps not. Hair was as tied up in my identity as much as anything else I could think of when it came to something I’d always been known for. Now, I shave my head, and find it freeing. Yet, deep down inside, I still long for for those days when I had the freedom of having hair on my head and didn’t have to decide whether to wear a wig to the pool or just dive in au natural. Hair remains a topic I find fascinating. It can a be a prison, but not having it is both freeing and limiting at the same time.
Hearing about the freedom you feel in shaving your head is just incredible. The way that hair holds such dichotomies is a constant source of wonder for me. Thank you so much for sharing your hair journey. It is always a privilege to hold these hair stories.
Thank you!
Thank you for this essay. I never thought to think of Elisabeth’s hair in that way.
I visited the palace in 1995 and became intrigued by Empress Elisabeth and bought a biography by Brigitte Hamann called “The Reluctant Empress--A Biography of Empress Elisabeth of Austria”. It’s fascinating and heartbreaking. The biography is a bit controversial because the author dives into what was making Elisabeth so unhappy and ill. I highly recommend it.
At 65, when so many women my age seem to be wearing their hair short, I’m letting mine grow, to see how long it can get. It’s thin and wavy/curly, so weight isn’t a problem. I wear it up to keep it out of the way; I let it down and braid it at night for sleeping, as my great-grandmother did.
Oh, thank you so much for this recommendation! I think I've read a bit of the controversy around this biography, but have never read it myself. I love that you are keeping a family hair tradition alive in growing yours out and maintaining it as your great-grandmother did. I am also growing my hair out and it has been a journey of patience and endurance!
I know hair was important to my mother, when a child, she always saved my locks if they were cut and pressed them in books for safe keeping!
Wow, an incredible image! I've been collecting so many stories from folks lately about their mother's expectations of their hair. There's really something in that! Do you still have these hair books? It reminds me almost of Victorian hair-wreaths: a sort of family tree of hair.
I loved reading this, so interesting and detailed . I never thought reading about the power of hair could be so entertaining and informative . So Thankyou for posting this. I am also an artist, essentially a textile artist, so I would also be very interested discovering what you do in your creative world as well as you writing.
Thank you so much for this, Ruth! It really means a lot. Currently working on some pieces based on hair and will gladly keep y'all updated. So look forward to future conversations here!
I watched a show about Sisi a few months ago…this was far more interesting!
Haha, I'm so glad! Maybe we watched the same one?! 'The Empress' on Netflix ? They did not focus on her hair nearly as much as I was hoping :) Maybe in future seasons?
I only have one book of poetry with my hair. I believe it dates from 1949. I’ve protected this book.
I am so happy your substack appeared in my reads this weekend! What a fascinating look at Empress Sisi and the symbolism and substance of her hair. It gave me pause to think about my own motivations for letting my hair grow longer than it has ever been. Soon to be turning 60, I have the Jan Brady look. (I'd say Marcia Brady but the middle daughter is more befitting of me in actuality.) With the encouragement of my son, I have let blonde locks yield to the emerging grays and white tones. My son likens it to silver and gold, reminding me of my value.
I think I am letting it grow and transform in color to explore the crone energy...a symbol of wisdom perhaps. I'm about to embark on my summer gig as head lighthouse keeper on an offshore lighthouse. On station my hair gets a pony tail and a baseball cap. Occasionally I don a hard hat. My mantra is lighthouse hair, don't care. I keep it simple out there.
I'm excited to now be subscribing to your substack!
Hi! I just found your Substack. Very interesting that you write about hair! As a black woman with long dreadlocks that I have been growing them for 14 years, my hair is emblematic of my spiritual journey and self-love. It also gets me a lot of attention, and is a huge part of how other people identify me, which varies depending on where I travel to, and what they associate with locs.
I wrote a memoir about my loc journey, called "Wisdom Tree: My 10 Year Journey with freeform locs". Maybe you'd find it interesting-I linked you to an excerpt. If you'd ever like to collaborate in some way, let me know. I'd be interested to speak with you.
https://n3vlynnn.com/2019/12/19/wisdom-tree-my-10-year-journey-with-freeform-locs/
Hey welcome !! I am thrilled to learn about your memoir and how it is centered on your hair journey ! Thank you for sharing--I loved how you refer to your locs as "Sacred Antennae" in this piece. So powerful and true. The way hair becomes extra-sensory of the world around us. What you mention too about how hair holds both this undeniable expressive outward-facing power and yet is often treated as a "public" site that others feel comfortable mapping their own views upon is such an important split that hair can hold: the public and the private in a single space. I would love to hear more about your travels with your hair. I'm so glad you came across HAIR CLUB--I'd be delighted to continue the conversation.
Hey Suzanne, thank you so much for taking the time to read an excerpt of my memoir. I'm so happy what I've shared resonated with you-and yes, these are themes I deal with, daily-trust me haha! Definitely living it out. I'm glad I came across your blog, too-Substack definitely needs to highlight more diverse and unconventional authors. If you'd ever like to message me, my IG is @haus.of.isis. Still getting my contact form on my website to work properly 😅
Nice
Thanks for reading !