Hair

I don't know what to do and it frustrates me because its something so simple. A few weeks ago I walked into the Marty Robbins swimming pool and a lifeguard passing by waved and smiled at me. I asked him where the kicking boards were since I had my mind set on getting back in shape for summer and the smell of chlorine was giving me a sense of rush to jump inside the water. This lifeguard I speak of, had nothing particular that called out for attention. Dark honey colored eyes that hid behind glasses, short and clean haircut, and an honest smile is all I noticed at first look. 

A few hours into my swim he approached me and said, "Can I ask you something without you thinking the obvious?" He wanted to know my age, he explained how he was the coach of a swim team and would like to extend an invitation for me to join. Without me noticing, we became friends. Every day I'd go to the pool and be assured he'd be there waiting for me with a workout command ready. Of course every new day that passed by was just a chance to learn something new about him. Paul Berry was a student at UTEP pursuing a degree in History, he wanted to be a teacher. Ya know how every once in a while you meet boys with a pretty good sense of personality? Nice, polite, confident, driven, yadi- yadi- yada? Well Paul is one of them. I knew quite quickly that I could trust him, he was kind of like me.

One night after pool hours he was throwing away the trash and I headed towards my car, he noticed my hair. "Hey your hair is long." Now, I'm used to people commenting on my hair all the time. If you know me in person you will notice how big my hair is. Not only do I happen to have more than plenty of it but it, but it's also spongy and wavy. To make it worse, I don't like to comb it. What? It makes it have a personality of its own. Now that you have a mental image of my hair, let's get back to Paul.

I answered to his comment by telling him that it was an ambition of mine to donate it sometime but I just hadn't found the correct opportunity to do so. What came next was something I had completely unforseen. He said his mom had cancer and she was hairless at the moment so he knew she would greatly appreciate the act. We looked at each other with some sort of amused look upon our faces when he went on and said, "wow it's funny how everything happens for a reason."

Well I haven't returned to the pool ever since. After some critical thinking, something in me kept on saying it's not the right time to let go of it which makes me feel horrible considering Paul is such a great human being and I would have liked to help him out. There's days when I just want to go chop it off up to my neck and get it over with. Then I go back to thinking I've been growing it out since I was seventeen, it's my insulation during winter, and I've also never had hair this long. I'm stuck in the middle of a decision and it frustrates me because I often find myself asking, "Why does hair make such a big deal?"