Ladies, I have a question. Who has ever wanted to try out a new haircut but held off because they didn’t want to deal with the way it looked as it grew out?
While these days, I would answer you “yes, that’s me,” I will say that there was an unfortunate period where I did not think that far ahead and not only had a very bad haircut that I gave myself, but had the worst transitional haircut ever for two full years afterwards.
So, in the spirit of transitions, as well as benevolent self-deprecation and learning from my mistakes, who wants to go through my terrible looks of late high school together?
This is me circa early sophomore year. I am fifteen years old. Young and shiny. Look at all that hair. Fanned out, very thick, plenty of material to work with. Can’t go wrong, right?
Wrong, apparently. Would you, looking at the above two pictures, make this cut? The answer is, likely not. In fact, no one should do this. Ever. These are Bad Bangs. They are thick and deep and too short and too high and Not Good, and I should have laughed at this picture, put the scissors down, and told myself “Not today! Today I do not ruin my hair.”
But ladies, I did not do that.
Yeah. So … Here we have the face of that same girl about five minutes after the previous picture, realizing what she has done and regretting absolutely everything.
Now, a few months later…maybe not so bad anymore? I had at least kind of figured out how to style my terrible new fringe and they were no longer The Worst. Although, they were still definitely Not Great. All the same, this length wasn’t a bad look, right …?
Ohhhh god. I spoke. Too soon. Let me be very upfront in saying that this was the worst I have ever looked in my post-pubescent life, and I hate this picture so much. (So of course here I am sharing it with you all.)
My real thoughts on this hair are, “Have you ever seen a historical movie where the costume designers really didn’t give a shit about accurate hairstyles, but just did slightly different variations of what was popular when they made the movie?”
Yeah, so IMO I look like some bedraggled, ragamuffin kid in a1980s prairie drama who just wants to sit around, shoot his slingshot at birds, get tussled by his Paw and kill buffalo or something.
Does anyone else feel this? I don’t know, the half-grown out mullet look just triggers something very specific in my mind that I can’t name, but I know I hate. It’s half-washed-up-classic-rock-band-manager, half-spoiled-1800s-urchinboy, and I definiely was not going for either.
Oh thank goodness. A) I learned to use a blow dryer and B) I got a haircut—but like, an actual one, from an actual hairdresser. At least I was no longer waiting for the Very Bad Bangs to catch up to my long hair, and this short cut would help split the difference.
Honestly, almost a ’90s heartthrob look here. Young Leo vibes? River Phoenix who? This wasn’t the worst. Idk, anything’s better than the mullet prairie child.
Ah. There. Literally, it’s so close to being over with. This was the last good transitional hair picture, because pretty soon after this, the bangs caught up and I cut it all as short as it could go. Everything just grew out from there.
Honestly, it was hard to find many pictures from this period of my life. I think I was actively avoiding all cameras for about two years for that to work out because what you see here are most of the pictures of myself.
All I can say to that now is, having given up my short career as the world’s absolute worst beautician, I can look back on these with a healthy amount of gentle embarrassment and amusement.
After all, it’s just hair, I guess. It grows out.