I want them and then I don’t. I consider chopping them off but want to try and grow them out. I miss them, cut them, and then immediately regret it. I’m affected by the issue of wanting something I can’t have, or immediate gratification that eventually expires or backfires. Whatever the case, I seem to have found myself in a permanent love/hate relationship with my ‘fringe’.
I’ve had said ‘fringe’ for a little over ten years now, and for about the first five years I had bangs, I was pretty consistent. I couldn’t see myself without bangs. I experimented with long bangs, whole lotta baby bangs, side bangs, diagonal, blunt, choppy – everything, you name it, I’ve done it. Around my second year of college is when I started having the craving for an exposed forehead. Maybe it was the upkeep that was exhausting while living in the dorms. All I know is that’s when the battle began.
Since then, it’s been a rough ride. The longest I let them grow was actually that second year in college. I just about had enough, stopped cutting them, and they eventually grew to my chin. Then before you knew it, I chopped them off. After that, I’ve never been able to grow them long enough to put them behind my ears.
(My favorite baby bangs pros: Kathleen Hanna, Janeane Garofalo, & Claire Boucher)
And then I come across images of friends, entertainers, and models featuring bangs that make me crave them again (see image above ⤴). What makes this tricky is that everyone’s hair works different. My bangs can be wonky sometimes because I have a bit of a cowlick preventing my bangs from sitting nicely. When I went through my long five year streak of consistent bangs, that wasn’t an issue. I was able to tame my hair to cooperate, but after I take some time to grow them out, I find I have to start that taming all over again. I may have created this battle for myself by cutting them in the first place, but I’ve learned over the years that bangs and I should just be friends. (I say that now.)
When I grow my hair out, my forehead seems empty and I feel boring. I have yet to find a haircut that doesn’t make me feel boring when I grow out my hair. Maybe that’s the real dilemma here. Hmm.
So after seven months of no trimming, here we are starting the process over again. After I cut them this time around, I was able to shape them to how I wanted which made my immediate regret go away.
We’ll see how long this high lasts though.
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