Without long hair, I would be dead.

It’s how people tend to remember and recognize me. In fact, it’s how I tend to identify myself. But apart from these obvious reasons, my hair saved my life.

Everyone needs something to live for. Who cares if this something is as frivolous as hair (this follows kaytay’s ”as long as you’re free” ethic) - if it works, use it. The following is a semi-fictional personal story of my will to survive.

Once upon a time, in the year nineteen hundred and ninety eight, a young girl was faced with a daunting decision. Did she want to live, or did she want to die? Easy enough to decide – for most people, anyway. The need to survive is implanted deep in the human brain. But somehow, the girl’s brain was missing this default. She wanted to die. And she picked the most slow, terrible, scary, and painful way to do it. Only fitting.

A few weeks later, or perhaps it was months, the girl began to notice the effects of her slow suicide. Only two were good. All were dangerous. But the one effect that hurt her most emotionally was the loss of her hair. Her once-beautiful hair, cascading down her back past her bottom, was falling out by the handful. Only she had the power to stop it from disappearing completely, even if it mean sacrificing her dream.

She took the only option presented at the time.

It was time to start taking care of herself once again.

Following this remarkable change, the girl quickly regained her health and soon returned to a normal life. Long hair; a hero.