hairstyle Archives — Kyle A. Massa

Haircuts and the World Without Them

This might seem like an odd subject for our “World Without” series, but we’ve reached a point where we need to jump the shark. You know, like when The X-Files replaced Mulder and Scully, or when Fonzie literally jumped a shark on water skis. Plus, as I wrote this one, I realized it was pretty interesting.

So, without further nonsense, in a world without haircuts…

…Pantene Would’ve Produced The Rings of Power

In a world without haircuts, we’d have a lot more hair. And in a world with more hair, shampoo products would become even bigger than Silicon Valley tech giants. With their surplus income, I can imagine Pantene entering the streaming game with their own service: Pantene+ (just $7.99 a month, plus tax).

What’s the first IP they would adapt? Lord of the Rings, of course, because everybody has long, silky hair in Middle-Earth.

…Except Aragorn. His is kinda greasy.

…Edward Scissorhands Never Would’ve Found His Calling

Or maybe he’d put his scissorhands to different use. Why not circumcision?

…Wigs Would Become Obsolete

This would give my wife, Sara, and I quote, “extreme mixed feelings.” Let me explain.

According to Sara, French aristocrats of the 18th century used plaster to keep their big hair looking big. Apparently, this attracted rats who’d burrow inside the plaster while the aristocrats slept, inspiring the French to develop hairpins not for fashion, but for skewering nesting rodents.

This claim seems dubious to me, especially when Sara says they’d go about their days with dead rats rotting in their hair. There must be more to the story, but the ending always dissolves into unintelligible giggling. I’ll circle back if I ever hear the rest.

…My Hair Would Be Extremely Fluffy

My hair doesn’t grow down—it grows out. I’m fortunate that it grows at all, especially considering my grandpa began balding in his 20s, but headbanging to “Mars for the Rich” just isn’t the same when your hair has the approximate shape of a cream puff.

…I’d Have No Newsletter Subscribers

While we’re on the subject of my hair, I once sent a newsletter about it to all my subscribers. This was during the early days of the pandemic, so I, like many, hadn’t gotten a haircut in far too long.

My subscribers were not amused. In fact, 26 of them unsubscribed, which is a personal record.

Without haircuts, I’d probably send tons of newsletters about my crazy hair, losing more and more subscribers until I had none left. But hey, at least I’d save on my Mailchimp subscription.

…Scaling Towers Would Be Way Easier

Rapunzel’s hair is her calling card, but without haircuts, there would be a lot more Rapunzels. Hence the ease in tower-scaling.

…Long Nails Would Be the New Countercultural Statement

It was against the law to have fun in the 50s, so if you were a dude, society demanded you wear your hair short. That’s why the 60s countercultural movement embraced the flow. (For more information, I recommend the 1973 Who song “Cut My Hair.”)

However, long hair would be far more common in a world without haircuts. That’s why I think long nails would’ve become the new countercultural statement instead. “My nails are like my spirit, man: Dirty and untamed!”

…The World at Large Would Endure an Abject Tragedy

Aside from bellowing, cursing, and general lunacy, a hallmark of Nicolas Cage’s career has been his ever-changing hairstyles.

Compare the receding mullet of Con Air to the jet-black quasi-Pat Monahan spikes of Ghost Rider. And we can’t forget the California surfer flow of Season of the Witch. At a rough estimate, Cage’s unpredictable haircuts provide 28.9% of the fun of his performances, leaving the other 71.1% to the aforementioned lunacy. He’d still be great—just not as great. And if that’s not tragic, I don’t know what is.

…I Might’ve Avoided Not One, But Two Traumatic College Memories

I’m a bit of a cheapskate, so when my college chum Jason offered me a free haircut during our freshman year, I said, “Sure, buddy!” I should’ve asked for his credentials because, as it turned out, he had none.

I requested a cut like Leonardo DiCaprio in The Departed. What I got was Friar Tuck from Robin Hood. Jason kept clipping my sideburns, and, deciding they weren’t even, continued to clip them up and up and up until I no longer had any. He also left me nearly bald in the back, for reasons that remain unclear.

The result was so heinous I hid it beneath a hat for weeks on end. You’d think I might’ve learned something from the experience, but when senior year arrived, I asked my friend Erik to cut my hair next. In my defense, he cut his own and it looked good, so I figured he could do the same for me.

Again, I was mistaken. Erik took chunks from my scalp at random, making me resemble a head of broccoli nibbled by a rabbit. I still don’t understand how this happened. Sabotage, perhaps?

Whatever the explanation, in a world without haircuts, I might’ve been spared several weeks of people asking, “What happened to you?” (Also, this makes me think Ithaca College should offer a degree in hairstyling. Seems to be a common gap in our education.)

…The World Would Be Far Less Interesting

Haircuts are pretty important, I’d say, especially after writing this article. Good thing they’re still a thing.

Kyle A. Massa is a comic fantasy author living somewhere in upstate New York with his wife, their daughter, and three wild animals. His published works include three books and several short stories. When he’s not writing, he enjoys reading, running, and drinking coffee.

You can read more from the “World Without” blog series here. And if you want to see a specific topic, email kyle@kyleamassa.com.

Ray Manzarek (and his sideburns)

A video version of this post is available here.

About the most rebellious thing I did in my teenage years was grow out my sideburns like Ray Manzarek.

You might know Ray Manzarek as the keyboardist for The Doors. You might know The Doors as the psychedelic rock group that did “Break on Through (To the Other Side),” or “Light My Fire,” or “The End,” or any number of other rock radio staples.

I discovered the man and the group because of the music they made. But on a purely cosmetic level, I really admired Ray Manzarek’s sideburns.

Refer to the picture above. Ray’s sideburns were long and thick and perfectly symmetrical. To me, they were an almost artistic continuation of hair down to the upper jawline. It’s easy to grow out a beard or a mustache, but sideburns are different; they require a certain finesse, a certain style to pull off.

Being a dopey 16-year-old, I went ahead and assumed I had the requisite finesse and style. So I let my sideburns grow. And grow. And grow some more. Actually, maybe “mutate” is a better word for what they did.

My Manzarek-inspired sideburns developed a texture similar to bristles on a brush. I feared that if I trimmed them I’d ruin them, so they exploded not only downward, but outward, to the point that they protruded from either side of my head, sort of like wings.

I’d show you a picture, only I feel like that would be like a horror director revealing the monster in the very first scene. What you come up with in your mind is always more frightening, anyway. Suffice it to say that my sideburns really didn’t look very good.

That fact, however, wasn’t especially important to me. What was important was that no one else at school looked like me, and I didn’t look like anyone else. I’d basically joined a party that had ended four decades prior, but whatever.

I think pretty much every American high school kid goes through this phase at some point in adolescence, this phase where we copy a behavior or a trend that seems unique, even though we’re making it less so by copying it. Only for my phase, I copied an anachronistic (and kind of gross) hairstyle.

I remember re-watching an old video of myself playing basketball during the Manzarek Sideburn Era, one that my dad had filmed. He’s talking with my cousin in the background, and my cousin asks where I am on the court. My dad says something like, “The floppy hair and the sideburns.” There’s a pause, and then my cousin says something like, “That’s an interesting look.” And then nobody says anything.

The sideburns died sometime during my junior year. My mom politely handed me an electric razor and encouraged me to at least trim the sideburns if I wanted to keep them.

Instead, I shaved them. The magic of the sideburns had dissipated. Besides, I’d been getting enough grief from my friends.

It’s funny how important those sideburns were for the short time I had them. The allure of facial hair to a teenage kid is something like tattoos to college students; it’s a form of self expression that goes beyond others because it’s right there on your skin, out where everyone can see it.

I still have sideburns, though now I trim them and they’re even with my eyes. I’ve attempted other hairstyles imitating other musicians; when I discovered Iron Maiden, for example, I very seriously wanted to grow my hair past my shoulders, a la Bruce Dickinson. It always grew outward but never downward, so eventually I gave up.

These days, I get a clean cut every few months. Sometimes I apply a little pomade to the front, but I’m afraid I’m getting too old for that look. That’s alright. A lesson I learned in high school: my hair is probably not my best medium of self expression. That’s what my crappy classic rock band t-shirts are for.

Maybe someday my Manzarek sideburns will return, perhaps if I’m forced into the witness protection program for some reason. But for now, I’ll stick with the hair I have. It’s a lot less itchy.

Kyle A. Massa is the author of the novel Gerald Barkley Rocks and the forthcoming short story collection Monsters at Dusk. His stories have appeared in numerous online magazines, including Allegory, Chantwood, and Dark Fire Fiction. He lives somewhere in upstate New York with his wife and their two cats.

Tag: hairstyle

The World Without Haircuts