My mom called it my Beatles look. Hair the same as when they played The Ed Sullivan Show. Glossy black hair that fades out before your ears but is still long enough to shake around when the music gets loud. A look that followed me through middle school and would catch a laugh on the bus ride home. If you waited long enough between cuts, it all would cover my eyes and reach the tip of my tongue if I stretched hard enough. Friends would tease and tell me to fling down my bangs and brood, striking a dramatic pose in the aisle seat like a twenty-first century heartthrob. 

“I want to let it grow out” was always my instruction for my stylist. Short hair just wasn’t my thing; I thought it made my skull look too thick and revealed all the imperfections of my scalp. In the end, though, my mom would always convince me to get it trimmed down. Her counterargument of “just removing split ends” would quickly snowball into a few inches off the top, and the process would repeat a few months later.

Getting locked inside for COVID with my family gave me a great excuse to fully commit to growing my hair. There was nobody to witness that awkward phase where everything is too short or too long in the wrong place, all the while independent strands keep finding their way into your eyelids. I started using old hair ties as a means to keep everything together and out of the way and let the matted mess of things sort itself out. It was alien having that dry rubber crease against my skin and that strain against my temples when I tied it too tight. I had to learn from scratch how obsessively you have to brush your hair to avoid knots, what shampoo and conditioner work best to treat your scalp, and how to not freak out over the great deal of shedding that occurs with long hair. 

My grandmother took notice of the changes and announced to the family: “I like your hair down. It makes you look like an Indian. I don’t like it when you keep it up. It makes you look like a girl.” Later, I would get compared to Maui from Moana and Li Shang from Mulan and others known for having long hair and a not-so-white complexion, but as I reentered the public eye, would others see me to be like a girl? I discovered scrunchies and claw clips but was often disappointed in the way they clashed with my own aesthetic. I didn’t want anything too girly, but you have slim pickings when your choices are a French braid, ponytail, or a man bun. The word man seemed to be the one that was made for me, so I’ve stuck with it since. 

 As time passed, the fascination with my hair growth dwindled for everyone except my mother. Still she hounded me on styles and care and what to do when my hair starts to curl at the ends. She had no daughters or sisters in her life, and my hair was the closest she would ever get.

Walking past her room one day, she again called me in to talk hair care, but also to ask: “Can I brush your hair?” She asked while shifting her weight across her chair. “I never got to brush anyone’s hair and yours is just so thick and-” 

Before she could continue backpedaling, I grabbed a chair and pulled up in front of her. I took my hair out of the lazy bun I had been throwing it in for years and let it flow back down into its natural state. She took up a brush and started to gently paw at my hair. I can’t tell you when she changed her mind, but I know she can see how happy I am now, how grown I have become. Next to her were new bottles of the shampoos and conditioners she recommended for me as well as a brush she intended to give me, whether I let her use it or not. She was gentle, not wanting to hurt me, but I wouldn’t have minded. Growing hair takes time, and though the roots stay new, your ends stick with you, split or not. I was new and I was grown, but to her I was still that boy who wanted to let his hair grow out.