I’m happy to share with you that I’ve made some progress since my first Jimmy, Meet World post, in which I took a look at my look to see what I could do to make myself less freaky-looking as I introduce myself to people in my community. I got a haircut.
I’ve spent most of my life with hair that draws on the “bell” motif. At first, the bell was the result of my mom cutting my hair to fit the times–think Luke Skywalker. Later, I was just reluctant to maintain a coherent and/or respectable appearance. My mind was usually on other things, things like art and what song lyrics mean and, later, how best to parent a short-tempered daughter, and so on. Even mirrors conveniently have shown me only what I want to see, which is just enough of my features to recognize myself as I wash my face or check for pepper in my teeth; my scruffiness is edited out by a brain that hasn’t cared about scruffiness until now. Only in photos did I see myself as I looked to others, like a sad sap from the ’70s.
What I have now is versatile: it can be styled back or up or forward. I can probably get it to stand up in an inspired-looking mess, like you see in portraits of old classical composers. But what’s key in this cut is the clean edge around the ears. It acts like one of those slim, solid frames that contain a de Kooning or Joan Mitchell painting: it gives permission for whatever is within–or above in my case–to be as crazy as it wants to be. Most of the time, however, my hair will probably look a lot like it does above, as I spend the day pushing my fingers back through it. But I reserve the option to tousle and texturize as needed.
So, I got a haircut. I tell you this not because I’m in a sharing mood–I like to share, but I have some sense of self-censure, too–but because what’s happening on this site and in this blog is the journey of a virtually unknown artist from his current state of near obscurity to one of public note. I’m drawing up plans right now for the first direct phase of meeting my local public here in Garland, TX, and those will go up soon.
This blog is handy for me. If I say I’m going to do something here, I’ll feel like a jerk if I don’t do it. I’ll be announcing my first venture into the actual, physical public in the next few days.