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Paperwork: There’s more to hair than cutting, shampoo and where to paint purple · Illinois Valley - Shaw Local

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Paperwork. There's more to hair than cutting shampoo and Where
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  Speaker 1: to Paint Purple? Written by Lonnie Kane. This article is
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  Speaker 1: being read by an automated voice brought to you by Everlet.
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  Speaker 1: I was eavesdropping. The subject was hair. Two women were
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  Speaker 1: talking nearby, close enough for me to catch a couple
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  Speaker 1: of sentences before they moved on. My nephew was visiting,
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  Speaker 1: and he has one of those military buzz cuts, said
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  Speaker 1: the ant, Then laughing, she added, I remember when he
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: was a teenager and his hair was long and he
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  Speaker 1: combed it straight up. That's all I heard, but it
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  Speaker 1: was enough. I had no problem picturing the spiked hair.
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  Speaker 1: I smiled, because I've always thought that particular do was ridiculous.
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  Speaker 1: But that's kind of the point, isn't it, Which is
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  Speaker 1: why I made a note to myself about what Aunt
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  Speaker 1: said about her nephew, about how he had changed, which
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  Speaker 1: is not uncommon and seems to be part of growing up. Still,
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  Speaker 1: that moment of eavesdropping left me thinking about hair and
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  Speaker 1: how we play with it over time. Then I had
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  Speaker 1: this deep thought. Throughout most of our lives, our hair
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  Speaker 1: makes a statement. It tells the world who we are
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  Speaker 1: or how we feel. Or who we refuse to be.
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  Speaker 1: I know there are patterns, cultural patterns that seem to
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  Speaker 1: fit certain generations, then shift with time, and there's always
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  Speaker 1: pressure to conform. It's interesting, though, how hairstyles change. It
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  Speaker 1: always must be radically different, right, our generation cannot look
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  Speaker 1: like our parents. Looking at my early days, the dilemma
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  Speaker 1: with hair was long versus short curls or no curls.
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  Speaker 1: Color issues revolved around blonde versus brunette. We had advanced
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  Speaker 1: from the greasier era, sort of not sure that era
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  Speaker 1: will ever completely disappear. My generation chose to let its
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  Speaker 1: hair down. Literally. Images of the nineteen sixties leaned toward
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  Speaker 1: the hippies, who tended to reject mainstream values and rules
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  Speaker 1: such as cutting your hair. The more conservative rebels kept
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  Speaker 1: the locks longer, but off the shoulders. Our music heroes
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  Speaker 1: helped set that pattern, all out the Beatles, etc. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: I think we wanted to view our hair more as
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  Speaker 1: a statement than a fashion, a protest of rules, perhaps
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  Speaker 1: a push for change, or simply to be different. Not
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  Speaker 1: from each other really, but from those old folks. We
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  Speaker 1: will never be. Ah Now I'm the old folk. I've
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  Speaker 1: noticed the unkempt look now seems to be cool. Sorry
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  Speaker 1: I missed that fad. We used to call it bed
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  Speaker 1: head again hair making a statement. It seems like the
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  Speaker 1: message always must be some form of protest, sort of
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  Speaker 1: a gesture to the previous generation. You know what gesture
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  Speaker 1: I mean, right? Also, I see that color as a
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  Speaker 1: wild card. Now is it the more colors the better?
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  Speaker 1: I'm not sure, But then I'm not supposed to understand.
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  Speaker 1: I'm supposed to be dazed and confused. It is hilarious
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  Speaker 1: how the older generation reacts. Yes, that means how I react.
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  Speaker 1: When I began to see purple streaks in my own family,
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  Speaker 1: I reacted appropriately for an old guy. My immediate thought was,
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  Speaker 1: what the hey, what are you doing to your hair
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  Speaker 1: that'll look great at your next job interview. I kind
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  Speaker 1: of have the same reaction to tattoos all over the body,
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  Speaker 1: but I just stared and said nothing. My reaction was
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  Speaker 1: normal for an old fogie. We keep quiet once we
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  Speaker 1: realize we are strangers in a strange land, unless we
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  Speaker 1: are asked our opinion. I strongly advise young folks not
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  Speaker 1: to do that. It opens a dark portal. It would
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  Speaker 1: be interesting to talk with someone who has snipped and
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  Speaker 1: trimmed and whacked and waxed through generations, someone who likely
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  Speaker 1: has seen a lot of fads come and go on
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  Speaker 1: the scalp. No doubt they have had to adapt and
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  Speaker 1: learn new skills, including sculpting and scripting across the temples. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: even the mohawk is a work of art, right, Yes,
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  Speaker 1: I think hair is still making a statement no matter
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  Speaker 1: how old we get. I know my hair does not
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  Speaker 1: that it's a statement I want to make. My hair
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  Speaker 1: just speaks for itself. I can hear it now, whispering
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  Speaker 1: down around my aging ears. We're still here, down here.
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  Speaker 1: Look closer, you'll see some of us are still here.
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  Speaker 1: Lonnie Kane, retired managing editor of The Times in Ottawa,
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  Speaker 1: also was a reporter for the Herald News and Jolia
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  Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventies. His paperwork email is Lonniejaccaine at
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  Speaker 1: gmail dot com or mail the News Tribune four to
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  Speaker 1: twenty six Second Street, LaSalle, Illinois, sixty one three zero
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  Speaker 1: one