February 12 – “Hair Wars”

I did some remembering yesterday.  I figured it would be good practice for when I get old … er.  I remembered back to when I was in high school in the very early 70’s.  That’s 1970’s, by the way.  Since I graduated in 1971, I guess I have to include one of those weirdo late 60’s as well.  I would have been a sophomore in 1969.  Horrible time to grow up.  Well, I guess when you’re 15 years old in the midst of the VietNam War and civil unrest and the assorted general craziness of being a teenager, everything seemed just a little more depressing than it had to be. 

One bright spot in all that goofiness was the easing of standards relating to … guys’ hair length.  Now that didn’t really affect my older brother.  He was driven at school and really focused on the academic side of the high school experience.  Not that he needed to be.  He was already really smart, but he actually seemed to enjoy studying.  Very different from me.  Oh, I got good enough grades (except maybe in higher level math – anything beyond algebra), but I had to work for them.  And I had to sacrifice, too, because I would much rather have been outside playing baseball.  And my brother was also on the school swim team.  Pretty impressive resume, huh?  Maybe it was the swim team that required him to keep his hair short.  But I wasn’t on the swim team.  So I took advantage of the easing hair restrictions.  The thing about my hair, though … it didn’t just grow down onto my shoulders.  It was way too curly for that.  It grew out as well.  Bushy is a good word.  Which I’m sure looked really silly on a kid that was struggling to eventually reach 100 pounds.  Sigh.  Memories. 

So what brought on the wave of nostalgia?  We had a visit from Kel’s kids on their way home from getting a haircut.  Jachin had the consummate older brother look.  Nicely trimmed, just short enough to fit under his baseball cap.  Micah declared his middle child independence by passing on the haircut this time.  His locks are definitely beginning to flow, and they are straight enough that he is definitely pulling it off.  And then there was Josiah.  The little brother.  Of course when he heard Micah was skipping the trim, that’s what he wanted to do as well.  Mom wasn’t quite as hospitable on that count, however.  He was getting a haircut, but she wanted him to be happy about it as well.  What compromise could she possibly come up with?  Ah … in her motherly wisdom she drew inspiration from the course of history.  Just as the trends of the 60’s gave way to other things in the 70’s and 80’s, so did the approach to haircutting in the Vaughan household.  Josiah came away with a haircut all right.  He now sports a Mohawk.  What decade is that from?  Hang in there, Josiah.  You are officially “Unique.”  That’s my boy.

Proverbs 20:29 says, “The glory of young men is their strength, gray hair the splendor of the old.”

Father, thanks for my gray hair.  I do miss that strength of the young, though.  Awaken it in those boys.  The strength, I mean.  Not so much the gray hair right now.  Amen.