Today is the day, at 2pm my hair will come off.

All of it.

I’m completely delighted to share that the running total of funds raised for Rowcroft Hospice and JusticeforLB is £5,380, a huge amount of money that will support the great work of both causes. There’s still time if you want to give us a quid or two, you can donate here.

I promised I’d blog honestly about how I felt throughout this campaign and this morning it’s a now familiar feeling of excitement, intrigue and mild panic. The one thing that everyone keeps promising is that it will be liberating. In the words of Yul Brynner:

In a funny way the shaving of my head has been a liberation from a lot of stupid vanities really, it has simplified everything for me and has opened a lot of doors.

So I’m optimistic, I’m not sure what exactly I’m being liberated from, but I do like the idea of not worrying at all about what my hair looks like. Can see that it will make for a simpler life, as long as I don’t get sucked into caring more about my appearance, just keep channeling Dad’s voice on that ‘for goodness sake, it’s [insert activity] not a fashion parade’.

Pic taken from this article on Women’s Liberation Origins and Development of the Movement. I can’t say I’ve ever really related very well to the women’s lib movement (which never goes well when you say it out loud).

It could be that I’m one of the lucky few born late enough to have reaped the benefits of this early action, or I just don’t notice my oppression, or single sex secondary education supported a self-belief and confidence in me. I feel sure that choosing to use two male names has opened doors I wouldn’t have known were shut to me, and I suspect that I’ve subtly chosen different values to pivot my choices around. I’m really not sure, but I am intrigued by the notion of being liberated. I also completely sign up to judging ourselves as people, and in the notion that accepting yourself is an act of civil disobedience, I’ll have me a bit of that.

I care about equality, and human rights for all. I care about everyone having access to a good life, and a good death, and #hairhack is just my small action to support that. I look forward to my liberation!

I’ll leave you with the Stephen Malkmus track that samples Yul Brynner (as shared with me yesterday by The Hatt).

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