Saturday, February 20, 2010

Pushing Me Away

I went to the salon a few days ago to have my haircut.  Usually my hair is the same old bob that i have worn for years, sometimes a different,  but for the most part, I've been wearing a bob now for idk 10 years or so.  I went in to the salon with a few ideas, but nothing concrete to tell the stylist.  I was thinking about an asymmetrical bob, that would be very short under one ear and would almost touch my shoulder on the other..... but it was still a bob......sigh.

While I was sitting there waiting, the memory of a emo hairstyle I had seen on a very cute boy, popped into my head.  And before I could really nail down what about that hair style that so captivated me, it was my turn in the chair.  As I sat down, worry began to swirl around me, every single time I have gone into a salon without a set in stone plan for my hair, the worst ever hair carries me out.  It always turns out way to fem for me to enjoy or actually even know how to maintain it if that was something I would want to look like.

As she swirled the cape around me, she asked what kinda of hair style I was looking for, and lost I looked up right into the photo of a cute guy.... My mouth seemed to open on its own, and what fell out of it was something like this;  I want the back short, shaped in layers like a guys, up and over the ears, they must be showing, i want those fringe like things in front of my ears, and the top long and messy with no part.

She clarified a few points with me, led me back to the shampoo bowl and washed me straight up, and led me back to the chair, and began to cut.  About half way thru cutting the back, way way to late in the game for me to pull out now, I got a severe case of cold feet, knees, legs and torso.  I sat there frozen in fear, wondering how long it would take to grow out enough to cut it into something more reasonable.  Hat season doesn't last forever, even in Alaska!

With my heart frozen, and my hope for a good hair style on the floor with all of my hair, she started on the front.  I hate getting hair in my eyes and so I closed them, and thankfully didn't have to watch with fear any longer.  And at one point I just had to see just how horrible it was turning out to be, so I peeped out and was amazed!

THE BEST HAIR STYLE OF MY LIFE!

It's kinda boy, but still girl enough not to raise eyebrows.  It's just perfect!  I started to grin at my reflection and just couldn't stop!  I grinned the entire time I paid.  Grinned while calling T.H. to come pick me up.  Grinned like a fool all the way to the truck.  And the thought that he wouldn't like my hair, never entered my mind.  But guess what? He loves it!  So double score!

It has been a few days now, and I can't stop touching it, I can't stop looking at me in the mirror..... something I honestly try really hard not to do, me and my reflection have never been friends.  But, it looks like me inside, kinda and right now am happier than I have been in a very long time with my appearance.  The first week of March, I go back to the salon for a color....

My hair has been threaded with gray since I was 23, and have at random times have colored my hair various shades of brown, or auburn.  So, I have new a decision to make, what color? The part of me that wanted facial piercings, wants eggplant colored hair with the tips and the back in black.  However there is a big part of me that is worried about looking like a silly person, who is much to old to wear that kind of colored hair........  So, once again the eternal struggle between what I want, and what I think I should have.

Lately I have lost the ability to talk to T.H. about my gender issues.  Two weeks ago I was talking on the phone, I have always hated my voice with a passion.  Why?  It is very high, I have always said that my voice sounds like Mickey Mouse.  And like a bolt out of the blue, it hit me, I hate my voice because it's not what I sound like inside, I sound much more masculine in my head to me.  Needless to say, I was all kinds of excited and rushed to tell T.H.  And then I saw it, his face just closed up taking my heart with it.  I had passed some sort of no fly zone that I never knew existed, and he didn't want to hear it.

It was everything I could do not to cry, but as I struggled to hold the tears back while I was folding laundry, I felt a part of my newly opened self wither.  I have had a few other revelations, that in hindsight are so obvious as to be glaring, how on earth I never connected the dots before this is beyond me.  But, each and every time I open my mouth to tell T.H. I just can not get the words pass my throat.  And a few times have had to think of something quickly to cover the fact that I was going to say something, but changed my mind.

So, now I find myself in a funny place indeed.  My best friend in the entire world, doesn't want to hear what I need to say.  This is really the first time in our relationship that I can't bring my thoughts and feelings to T.H., and am rather stymied by it.  I need to talk about this.  I have to talk about this.  And no, I have not become a one topic pony.  My conversation still flows over and around many topics each day, business as usual in my daily chatter.  Days will pass where I don't feel the need to talk about being androgyne. Then an idea or a question occurs to me, and there is no one to talk it over with leaving me sad and rather adrift.

I'm hoping that this is only temporary, but something inside me tells me it's not.  That this is the new status quo for the topic of my gender issues.  For now, I will let it sit, maybe it was just moving to fast for him to deal with.  He likes to take his time and mull things over.  Me?  I am more of a quicksilver person making up my mind quickly and am usually happy with the results of my decisions.  So, I am going to give him some time to process this new and still unfolding me, and hope for the best.  How long will I wait until I shake him?  That is hard to say.  His clock is ticking though, the countdown has begun, and one day soon it will run out into the woods of the most dreaded words any couple can hear from their partner, "We need to talk."

5 comments:

  1. As you already know I love your hair!

    I don't really know what to say, this situation is what I most feared. I've only got one real question at the moment is it that TH can't talk about it or doesn't want to talk about it? To my mind that's the first and most important thing to know. Beyond that I don't know what to say but I am very upset to hear about this.

    Love
    Mac

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  2. I think you are taking all the tiny steps towards the you with whom you feel most comfortable.
    As foe T.H., perhaps he feels when you come share these new thoughts or breakthroughs, you are changing from the person he's always known into someone he doesn't.
    Doesn't mean he doesn't want to know you, but he's going through his own changes, too.
    I think you should still talk to him, but take it quiye slowly--the talking that is--and ask him, make sure, he wasnts to know.
    You two sound like you have a wonderful honest relationship, so keep taking it slowly, because, each breakthrough you have, you want to shout from the rooftops, and he might be mssing the "old" you.

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  3. Give him time.

    The person he's been married to and loved for 31 years has just been replaced by someone who looks exactly like her, but isn't her. He just needs time to adjust to the fact that this new you is exactly the same as the old you, he just has some new information.

    Hang in there!

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  4. I am so glad to hear about the hair style. You should send me a photo of it in email.

    As for T.H. I think the whole giving him time and keeping conversation lively and normal will be the best bet

    Lots of love and a big hug on the sad days!

    Ryan

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  5. Great that your hair came out so wonderful! Great that TH loves it too. I'm sorry that he doesn't want to hear why it so fits the way you feel about your self. (BTW I'd love to see it too.)

    You are lucky that, up until now, you have been able to talk about everything with him. 31 years is a long time to know someone and there is a groove everyone makes in there feelings towards someone else. You've jumped the groove. You are still going in the same direction, but out of his groove. As we get older, all but the most open of us lose some ability to widen our groove about others. He may come around, as you are his best friend, but this could be hard and may take a while. Your views about you may really, at least in his mind, effect his views about himself. That may be the real issue here and he doesn't know how to express it.

    My wife and I may have some of that going on unconseously too.

    Hugs, Roger

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