By Caro Cooper –
I have a bad track record with haircuts. It started with a spiral perm, including fringe, in year 2. And another in year 6. Then I started cutting my own hair, which was fine until I discovered grunge in year 9 and embraced the “mess is best” ideal. But nothing was quite as bad as my hair show experience.
Have you ever been an insecure, gangly young woman? My relationship to my appearance can be summed up by an experience I had at the beach as a highschooler. I was coming out of the water with my friend and sister when a boy a few years younger than us came over. He pointed at my friend and said, “You’re the prettiest,” then to my sister, “Then you,” and finally to me with a grimace on his face, “And you last.” This brat, who’s probably now a finance millionaire, likely had no idea how much that interaction would haunt me. Haunted like a bloody old house, I was.
That’s the level of insecurity I was operating with when, on my walk into uni one day, a man asked me to be a model. Me?! A model! Yes! Finally someone had seen me. He clarified it was hair modelling and I’d need to meet at a hotel in the city at 6pm that night and be available all weekend. On writing this now, I realise how lucky I was that this turned out to be legitimate. I was young, broke and desperate for validation, so my adventure began.
