Fine Cut

Sunday is head-shaving day. I'm disinclined these days to let my hair stray to any length beyond a centimetre or two, in fear that may I start listening to Ravi Shankar and calling myself "Bilbo".

It is a historical oddity, however, the way that we've equated hair to strength and masculinity in times gone by. Most folks familiar with the Old Testament will know that long-haired Samson was considered the cock of the Bible until he got his head cropped, at which point he'd have struggled to take on even an enthusiastically cheek-turning Jesus. The Cavaliers and Roundheads were essentially 17th century hippies and skins, albeit with less ganja and more wholesale massacre. And in recent times, we've alternated between the heroic long locks of Nelson's naval officers, to the short shanks of the World Wars, through the anti-establishment scruffs of the Sixties to the stubble-crowned herberts of the last thirty or forty years.

It's simple stuff, devoid of mystical force, and never worth being judged on; like most other things that fade with time.