Shaved heads

I wanted to share another pet subject of mine: shaven heads. I love them on boys, but they must be the precise length, just a little amount of fuzz to be strokeable but nowhere near enough to grab hold of (that's what collars and leads are for, surely?) I like the fact that something which can ostensibly be seen as macho would, in this instance, be something submitted to. It's also a nice punishment piece. Especially if they have that sort of pretty-boy floppy hair that's doing the rounds. I've always wanted to shave Hugh Grant's head, or Paul Bettany. All the associations are fantastic - slave, captive, thing, animal, pet. I think of Samson, those locks of strength curling down onto the floor.

For girls, it's even more impactful, the short, sharp, shock has never been in the traditional female haircuts list. This isn't the gamine, elfin crop that lends itself a coquettish air of androgyny (the kind of haircut I currently sport, for example). This is full-on, eye catching and damn obvious, which is why I desire to do it and why I'm scared to do so. It isn't cute, it's hard. It's also much more likely to provoke questions, not all of them good. There is the aesthetic issue. I would worry a little about how it looks, whether my ears would stick out, whether I would look strange (I know that looking strange is part of the point, but there's strange and strange - we want to look kinky and we want to look good doing it). Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder though, and if you had someone commenting on how hot it was regularly and it provoking the response of them jumping on you the minute you got in the house then I think that might go a long way to overcoming any such issues.

Then there's the fact that it's not something you can take on and off. It's permanent - or at least around for a few months. You have to go out with it, to the shops, to work. Everywhere. On a very mundane level, I'd get a cold head in winter and a burnt one in summer - having to hide such a status symbol under a hat seems to miss the point. Then there's the chemotherapy link: someone I know, when commenting on a woman who had shaved her hair, thought it was cruel on those "poor women who have lost their hair" - an indictment to the extent with which womanhood is associated with hirsuteness (only on the head, eyebrows and eyelashes though - everywhere else it must be removed!) That's not really the response I'd be gunning for and it's strange to think that if I did take the plunge there might be those who would look badly on me for doing so. The shaved head = lesbian is a stereotype I am happier to deal with, it's not true, but it at least points people in the right direction. Yeah, it's a sexual thing. No, I'm not gay. But keep going... (insert knowing look and a wink here).

So why would I want to do it? I love the statement it can make - getting rid of all those feminising associations of long Goldilocks tresses and I love it as something to offer up to a dom. I love my hair, I love colouring it and messing about with it, I love it's softness and buy nice smelling shampoos. It would be a big thing to give up and therefore an important and valuable thing, a measure of trust and ownership. Like tattoos and piercings altering the body alters my perception of its use, its purpose: it's the map upon which I design my life. In many ways, I operate my D/s as an ongoing system of exchange. I give up this in exchange for that. Power dynamic as tit for tat. I give you my hair and you give me the security and safety of being yours, for example. The shaven head is the sign that I am yours, like a collar, but worn everyday. Obvious, part of me and visible to all.

Whether on a boy or a girl, this should never, ever be done at the hairdressers. Oh no. The hair - or lack thereof - is a statement, a symbol of the connection between the sub and dom. A regular little ritual, to sit or kneel down and, perhaps locking wrists behind your back, closing your eyes, whilst they use a set of clippers to take away your crowning glory and leave you to sweep it into the bin. Walking or crawling back into bed to lay an almost naked scalp onto their shoulder.