Pink

The girl got her first haircut yesterday. Her unruly bangs had been hanging in front of her face, all the way down to below her nose. She would push out her lower lip and blow up in an attempt to clear a visual path. The hair would lift and fly away only to resettle again in her view. She looked like a teenage boy without the surliness. I will miss that.

The haircut has turned her into a little girl, almost erasing her pleasant androgyny, a trait not uncommon to babies. Her face is now framed, her eyes unblocked. The back of her hair, merely trimmed yesterday, has become much more curly and wavy than either her mother's or mine when we were infants. Her hair is changing. Though not remarkably long as yet, she no longer has the look of Mia Farrow, circa 1967, of which I had grown so fond.


Since my wife has made it clear to me that I'm not to touch their hair, the haircut was accomplished at a salon that caters only to kids. Seated in a firetruck or an airplane and with any number of Pixar flicks or video games for distraction, the squirmers move little enough that the threat of drawing blood is kept to a minimum. It's cheap, fast and adequate. Considering the quantities of semi-chewed foodstuffs, snot, and general filth with which infants and toddlers accent their coifs, it's not as if her hair needs a stylish cut.

While the scissors snipped and my wife recorded the moment for the photo albums I looked around. I had been there before with our son, but my daughter's presence made the scene more acute. In addition to haircuts, the salon specializes in princess glamour parties - "ideal for birthdays". Little girls can gather together to get manicures, ultra hairstyling, and all manner of Jon Benet feminizing. A separate space was dedicated to these events with loudspeakers, pink streamers, feather boas, make-up and of course, a throne where I imagine the girl of honor is feted. As a result, while my little girl sat happily ringing the bell of the fire engine, her hair drifting to the floor, I found myself fearful for her.
She wears her brother's cast-off clothing; the blue shirts, denim overalls and onsies with cowboy prints, that simple economics demanded we use again. They amplify her gender ambiguity. Though I hate most of the choices offered by the princess-industrial complex, she has, of course, more girlish clothing. Her pink jumper, the grey felt dress with the little bunnies, the peasant blouse with giant embroidered tulips, and all the other more feminine ensembles tend to be used when she is going out of the house. They help strangers avoid the discomfort of gender mis-identification, I suppose.
I had always wanted a girl. I'm determined to raise a strong, self-confident young woman, one who will not feel cut off from any options in life; not trapped in someone else's idea about her possibilities. I want her to know that her gender defines part of who she is, but not what she can be; that pink is just one choice among many. More and more however, I wonder how effective I can expect to be in the face of a cultural onslaught.

My wife is unconcerned, or at least less concerned than I. She says she enjoyed those things as well and she never felt limited. She is a highly educated professional. In contrast to more typical gender scenarios, my wife is the family's sole financial support. I could not find a better role-model for our daughter. So why am I still afraid for her? Why do I hate the pink so much? And what will I do when the inevitable glamour party invitiation arrives? As if I don't have enough to keep me awake at night.
Before we left the salon yesterday, I picked up a curling lock of her hair from the floor, a typical keepsake. It has the fine qualities of her initial baby hair; soft, light as a feather. I don't know what I'll do with it yet; slip it in an envelope or the album. As I felt the strands between my fingers it dawned on me that, like her hair, she will become what she becomes, and for much of it, it seems, I will worry.