“You’re hair is okay now,” she says unsolicited, my waitress, as she studies the picture on my debit card, then me, then the picture on my debit card again, “but your hair is super cute here.” “I mean,” she continues, “your face is absolutely made for short hair.”

“Thanks,” I smile as I sign my lunch receipt on the dotted line while wondering if what she said was actually a compliment.

“Have a nice day,” she smiles and walks away after I hand her the paper I just penned.

“Your Aunt Patty says the same thing,” my mom says as I slide my debit card back into my pink pocketbook. She’s my lunch date, my mom. And we enjoyed every bite since it’s something that doesn’t happen as often as we’d like since we live in separate states.

“Are you serious,” I say. I mean, I only see my mom a few times a year and I see her older sister, my Aunt Patty, even less.

“Yeah,” my mom continues, “I wasn’t going to tell you, but she did mention it after her last visit with you a few months ago.”

“I’ve had the same haircut for years and years though,” I groan trying to defend my decision to lengthen my locks. “And I’m going through a ‘grow out’ phase right now.”

And if you’ve ever gone through a ‘grow out’ phase, you know how horrible it is, except really, you don’t. My ‘grow out’ phase has been the longest, most excruciating, and worst looking, in the history of the world. And I’m not exaggerating.

I mean, my hair was, at its shortest, the length of a couple centimeters in the back. Seriously. My hairstylist would use sheers to shape it every four weeks. So, how ever short your hair was, mine was shorter. How ever long it’s taken you to grow your hair out, it’s taken me longer. How ever awful you hair looked during your ‘grow out’ phase, mine has looked worse.

And get this: Aunt Patty and my lunch waitress are not the only people who tell me I should wear my hair super short. I hear the same statement every day since there’s not only a picture of me with my pixie on my debit card, but my driver’s license as well. And trust me when I tell you every one, and I mean every one who sees it has an opinion. And it’s never, ‘I just love your hair now. It’s so much better than the picture on your debit card. I mean, yuck, right? Good for you for growing it out.’ No one ever says that. Ever.

“I know,” my mom pauses while trying her best to support me. “You’re allowed to grow out your hair, if that’s what you want to do.”

She doesn’t like my longer locks either, my mom. She’s always the first one to say how much she loves what I’m wearing, or how pretty my new make up is, or how cute I am. She’s never once said she likes my new hair.  Never once.

And guess what, David hates my hair too. “I met you with super short, fun hair. That’s how I’ll always remember you,” is what he says whenever I ask him whether he likes my hair.

WELL, GUESS WHAT, PEOPLE??? I’M GROWING OUT MY HAIR!!! AND IT’S GOING TO BE GORGEOUS!!! GET USED TO IT!!!

And that’s all I have to say about that.