When I finished up my newswriting class this summer, after a month and a half of dressing up nice and looking presentable for interviews, I decided I wanted to get a mohawk when I was through (I’m so hardcore, right?)
 

Originally, I was just planning to have the mohawk for a month–just to have some fun with it–and then cut it off. It’s been a month now, though, and I’ve decided (at some cost to myself) to keep the mohawk, at least for the time being, because I’ve enjoyed the experience so much.
 

I wasn’t ever really planning for this blog to be a “personal” blog, but this post, at least, will be somewhat so (I’ll re-evaluate whether this will become a pattern later.)
 

I spent a few weeks saying I was going to get it before I actually had the appointment to get it done, but I don’t think anyone really believed I was going to go in and get it done–I guess I just don’t seem like the type of person who would do something like this. In all honesty, I’m not. I’m typically shy, reticient, withdrawn–definitely the last person who wants to walk into a room and be noticed or bothered. I’m not hardcore; I don’t have any tattoos or piercings (even though I’ve had quite a few people ask where they were, since doing this.)
 

On a certain level, though, the mohawk was oh-so-me. I’ve never really fit in, but I usually try to look like I do, so I can go unnoticed. Despite the increased attention, the experience has been really revelatory for me:
 

Most people treat me the same, some people treat me much better, and a few people haven’t treated me all that great (but no one has really been overtly ugly to me–something I wasn’t quite expecting here in Lubbock.) It really is revealing, about others, how they treat you when you fall outside of their expectations–their conditioned norms.
 

I’ve also always had a hard time accepting compliments–not that this has entirely changed that–but I’ve become much more comfortable with the concept when I have someone approach me a few times a week to talk about it. I’ve only gotten a few “hair” compliments in my life, both after I got highlights, and both from people I already knew. Strangers approaching you, both young and old, is a new beast.
 

I’ve had a bit of a hard time coping with hair loss at a young age (started at 19) and haven’t really had any sense of pride when it came to my hair in almost three years. Sometimes I like to think I’m above emotional influence–that I’m too rational for that–but feeling good about my appearance was quite the change. In fact, I was hired by the Daily Toreador to work this fall, but ended up declining the job in favor of keeping that feeling (much to the lament of my parents.)
 

I don’t know that I’d say I’m a “new” person, but this experience has had a profound impact on me, internally (and at a time when I really needed it.) The day I got my hair cut and for a couple days after, as I’ve said before, every time I looked at a mirror, my day got a little better. I’ve really felt happy enough to smile spontaneously, off and on, throughout the day, only three times in college if not recent memory, and one of those was the day I got my hair cut.
 

Am I going anywhere with this? I guess so. Try something new, something your friends and family don’t expect from you, and see what you can learn from it.