Necessity is the Mother of Mohawks

Ever since his birth, people would watch me lovingly stroking Benjamin's full head of hair and caution, "You know it's all going to fall out, right? Babies always lose the hair they were born with." But the months went by, and his hair just kept growing longer and longer. Last week, I was admiring my beautiful son in profile when I noted that we almost had the same bob hairstyle. At that moment I decided it was time for a haircut.

Vince and I decided that Benjamin's first haircut should be a mohawk. Now before you start shaking your heads and thinking we're wacky L.A. parents, you should know that Benjamin's 'do was pretty much headed into mohawk territory anyway. Let me explain... Benjamin had developed this awful habit of grabbing his hair when he got really upset. And since he's a baby with a baby's big head, his little fists would naturally land at the spots just above each ear on either side of his head. After weeks of grabbing and yanking, he'd inadvertently created two bald spots. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention. Or mohawks.

We brought Benjamin to First Cuts, an adorable kids' salon in Santa Monica where stylist Margan was more than happy to clip her client into a tiny punk rocker. As she snipped away, Vince fretted that he didn't want the sides of Benjamin's head shaved all the way down. Was he worried that the he wouldn't fit in with the kids at school? Who knows. In any case, Margan simply buzzed the sides of Benjamin's head into a "fauxhawk." But as we headed home, the complaining started. "You can still see his bald spots! Why can you still see the bald spots??" Uh, maybe because the sides were left buzzed as you had requested?

After an afternoon of listening to Vince fretting over the still-visible bald spots, I got fed up and told him that I would shave the sides of his head. Vince seemed to find this solution agreeable, so I went to Target, purchased the cheapest clippers I could find, slapped on the 1/16" fuzzing guard, and went to town. Five minutes later, we were done. As I admired my handiwork, Vince came over to offer his critique. He gave Benjamin a once-over, started pouting, and then cried, "But now he has a mohawk!" Say what? Mars and Venus, indeed.