Fleabag once said that Hair is everything, and yes, I am nobody to question that profound statement. So what exactly is cutting your hair in terms of this revelation, is it offering a possible contradiction? Not for me. It is asserting my dominance over my hair for the briefest possible moment, saying 'no, you're not really everything', before it goes back to reclaim its position.

Historically, women have been cutting their hair off for myriad reasons, all powerful in so many ways. It's often associated with shedding emotional hardships and beginning a brand new way of life and other times because it fell into their eyes too often. I've always thought of it as a brand of femininity. That something that seems so mundane can be so beautiful but also hold on to its mundanity if it wants to. I love it when women perform this sacred act and mind you when I talk about women this femininity that, I quote Adrianne Lenker, who so poetically croons to her lover, 'there's a woman inside of me, there's one inside of you too'. 

I have loved my hair long, I have loved my hair short. I haven't always been too kind to it, but it hasn't always been to me either so that's that. I'll curse and blame it on some days and on others I'll blame my total inability to capture its beauty in frame. The blame game is always played. 

I have associated cutting off my hair to this huge freedom that comes with the end of my exams. Is it fair of me to present it with all that weight? But then I think, never has there been a more apt, literal act that defines taking a weight off your head. 

P.S: I did donate it. That is the one thing that has only ever felt fitting.

Artwork: Nair Lady Adorning Her Hair(1873), Raja Ravi Varma