Approximately 1,5 year ago I shaved my head to stand for world equality and to give my visible vote for an Equal Money System. I faced quite some fears and it took me almost 3 months to get ready and shave. Within those three months I looked at the fears I had and did Self-Forgiveness on them, but only within my physical reality I could face my own effectiveness within my application of SF and had to correct myself further within the physical. Since I’m living as a foreigner in a small Catholic village in central Italy my villagers were not really enthusiastic to say the least when I shaved my head. A woman here in rural Italy is one with long dark hair, high heels, cleavage and most preferred a short skirt. Not that I fitted in this description before I shaved my head, but at least I had hair and they could still refer to me as a woman. The day I shaved the speculations started and I wouldn’t be surprised if some people made some sort of a bet on it. I had just gone through an event of bullying at school with my daughter A. which was in essence rasism and people started to ask if I had too much grief about this event that I shaved my head. A nice one and really dramatic, I hadn’t thought of that one as a reason for shaving ones head. Then the rumour started that I was suffering from cancer and was refusing to wear a wig. Though the final conclusion was that I had lost it for most of the population and the few that really went in conversation with me admired me, but couldn’t see any salvation of our current world within the words I spoke. Lots and lots of people got neck pains, a national Italian disease, due to looking after me when I was passing by. The people that I could look in the face had always a look of intense disgust. I made flyers to explain myself, but basically I was stuck in a polarity between admiration and disgust of my villagers and I decided not to go along with that and therefore kept my head neatly shaved for 1,5 year.
A bald head was the first way of approaching my head and me in a way that it didn’t cause friction within me.The moment I shaved of my hair and I looked in the mirror I saw ME as I understand ME within my current process. No hair anymore gave me the opportunity to look beyond my personalities, who were still there, but couldn’t be connected to my hair anymore. With the hair also my clothes changed into more comfortable clothes. I even went for a walk today with a combination of a flower skirt and a flower t-shirt that totally didn’t match in colour and pattern. There were times that I would have bothered about such a thing and would feel insecure. For a moment I hesitated if it was the “right” thing to do. I concluded that it was bullshit to not go for a walk around the block in 2 garments that are really comfortable to wear and tested it out in my reality. I’m still alive and after the first meters I forgot all about my non stylish outfit. So the shaving is a statement , but it also helped me through a lot of issues within my physical reality. Therefore I had no intensions to let it grow again.
Till the moment that my sewing business was not really running well. My neighbor from across the street, who does the same work as I, said after I asked her how business was going, it’s a bad period for us all. Though here in Italy nobody is very direct in his/hers answers so it could mean that she had still enough work and didn’t want to hurt me and came up with this answer or she really had less clients. I saw how people were avoiding me in the village and the clients I still have do really not care about me having hair or no hair. So I decided to investigate this point within my physical reality and let my hair grow till a point that I felt comfortable with.
The first day that I went to my grocery shop with an almost crew cut, the lady of the shop suddenly started talking to me and making friendly faces. I was surprised, I always perceived this lady as a grumpy woman that hardly looked me in the eyes. Then a friend of mine asked in this special way if she was right about me letting my hair grow, as if she asked me if I was pregnant, the same tonality was in her voice. It was as if suddenly I was again part of the zombies, my hair made me again part of the club of zombies. I knew that we humanity are hypocrites, but this was a firm confirmation.
I let my hair grow till it was about 1,5 centimeter long. I noticed that on top of my head the hair was growing in the air like little antennes and the hair on my sides and on my occiput was growing flat against my head. This gave my head this oval shape. I suddenly didn’t see ME anymore and a not deliberately hairstyle developed. I saw resistance within me and points that I hadn’t taken on yet about me having hair and being defined by my hair style. I no longer could rinse my hair without being grassy and also resisted using shampoo again. So I had to make a plan about what I wanted to do with my hair and head. I decided to let it grow just a few millimeter which gives this idea of hair on my head, but it’s easy to manage without soap and makes people more at ease while being in my presence. It’s a decision I made in the moment and will be valid as long as I can be self-honest within it.
Perceiving myself as a person with hair again, I walked with my daughter A. in one of the nearby towns, wearing a skirt and t-shirt with cleavage. To me I was, without desiring it, dressed in an Italian adapted way. Till the moment that A. said to me, come on mom cross the street I’m already at the shop what is taking you so long? What took me so long was this retired man that started to walk towards me, over a distance of 500 meter, like a magnet. He was staring at me and couldn’t get his face in another direction and I had to step backwards to not been over-walked. I heard him mumble, a lady without hair? So I hurried across the street and while I looked behind me to see how the man was doing, I saw that he almost did a 180 degrees owl turn to look after me. I was astonished, he said a lady without hair, so I was still considered as having no hair? We found out that we had gone to the wrong shop and had to cross the square where the retired man with his pels was hanging around in front of the medieval town hall. I heard them gossip and almost gasping for air while seeing a lady with hair that didn’t count as having hair. It was all very entertaining to me and A. as these men revealed in one breath a long and rich tradition of how women should be.
I’m still one vote for an Equal Money System and world equality, nothing changed except I’m more with 2 feet on the ground again and traded guessing about how people would perceive me, with research within my physical reality. As my life and my process will develop so will my view on hair develop. For now the best approach, and still be able to reach out to most people, is to have a crew cut. And not to place myself outside the society I live in, due to inflexible opinions. I’m not going to fight the system, I’m going to work with the system and use the system to bring change. A change that we all know is necessary, but we’re too afraid that change never will happen. Investigate your reality and test your opinions and believes, you might be surprised about what you find.
Sylvia's writing to freedom 