My “last chance to grow my hair out” project was hitting that tricky point where I can’t do a thing with it, and I had started to lose heart and contemplate getting it cut, thus ending my youth. I’ll concede that, at 48 and a half, this may seem a bit flipping late.
At my best, I’d love to have hair like Tim Buckley. If you’re not familiar with him, he was a folk/rock singer and songwriter who died in 1974. His songs have affected me more than anyone else’s, since I first heard him sing in my early 20s. He was amazingly beautiful. He was also, apparently, a bit of a tosser. I can’t sing like him. I can’t play guitar like him. I’m almost twice the age he got to. But I could have his hair. Here’s Tim.
As a fallback, since I can’t quite get my Barnet to stand up like Tim’s, I’d settle for 70s ITV children’s show Magpie presenter, Mick Robinson’s look. Here’s Mick in his prime, if you’re not familiar with him:
Cool, huh?
Anyway: I’m stuck in that halfway place between looking like my hair idols and looking unhoused.
Tonight, in Loughborough, I’ve discovered that no-one else seems bothered what they look like. I’ve just been served by a perfectly pretty person, who for whatever reason had come as Peter Gabriel during his “Gabriel III” phase. By which I mean, unsatisfied with her own features, she’d done that thing that looks like a Sharpie accident and just drawn on features, like eyebrows and cheekbones.
Clearly, you can look how you want and it doesn’t matter. Hallelujah.
The hair stays, for now.
Oh and in case you can’t quite place the reference, here’s the PG I’m talking about:
Try not to lick it 