Postby Geirr » Mon Aug 29, 2005 9:07 pm
Hey Gang - it's been a couple months for me but I'm back visiting.
I have my own opinions on this but before I begin, let's remember that we all bask in the love of God, whatever our personal preferences and life experiences. Put short: "Your milage may vary."
[1] Personally I often find recessive traits somewhat more interesting and attractive in part because their relative scarcity makes the presence of a particular specimen or phenotype more noticable. So I've had more of a 'thing' for light colored eyes and straight hair. I also tend to dislike hair that is wider above the ears than anyplace below the ears. I enjoy the unusual combinations of hair color and eye colr found in anime.
[2] Most men across the world prefer long and flowing - the motion of the head is continued and magnified by the swirling of the hair.
Think of a powerful man making a decisive, argument-ending forearm gesture while in a sharp, well-tailored business suit, then turning around smartly on his heel and walking away. ["This is the way it's gonna be; and that's final. Done and Good Day."] Now imagine the same gesture and motion, but in a medieval time, with the man wearing the long robe or cloak of a person of power in that age. When THAT lord gestures and turns on his heel, several yards of fabric get put in motion, and remain in motion as the wave travels toward the hems. Then the turn of his body flares the cloak or robe outward, which continues to waft and collapse for a few paces after he has already broken off the conversation. There is more to look at; the meaning of his body language gets broadcast over a wider cross sectional area -AND- for a longer period of time.
And so it is with hair. Long hair amplifies and sustains the motions of the head it drapes, making a look of love or admiration last longer, and fiery anger or passion is just that much more pyrotechnic. I remember one time waiting for a bus, I spotted a blonde** with straight hair walking away from me. With each step the angle of her hair changed, moving like a uniform trapezoid in space as it rythmically caught the sun like a signalling mirror. At a mile and a half away I saw nothing but that hair, still blinking faintly like a distant navigational beacon.
It is interesting to note that in many cultures women use their good looks to attract a mate in marriage, and then, the degree to which that society holds married people to their word (in other words the degree to which divorce is socially despised or made legally or religiously difficult) happens to engender a weird effect in which women (and men too) disregard their looks once married. After marriage, the benefit for the continued levels of discipline, exercise, and dietary abstinence it takes to remain sleek seem to get lost once the chase ends. So it goes for hair length: in a number of European cultures it was not only hair length but certain kinds of droopy sleeves and headresses which were preferred by unmarried women, get tossed aside once she gets married. Shorter hair, no more pretty stuff. It's not needed anymore, right?
[3] Lastly, one of the things that I have often found funny was how when a woman office worker gets clipped down to a poodle-perm, -SO- many of the other women in the office will compliment her and tell her it looks great or 'cute?' Translation: 'Thanks, you've just taken yourself out of the competition!'
**PS: Hey does everybody still remember to use the '-e' in 'blonde' for a woman and -NOT- for men?
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