Hair Diary of a 2010's Wannabe Hipster

Middle school. MySpace was fading out but tumblr hadn't quite popped up yet. Kids were signing up to Facebook using fake ages or using their parents account. Cringe "notes" that were essentially a series of "Coke or Pepsi?" questionnaires were the thing. Or my favorite: those questionnaires that asked you to put your iPod on shuffle and respond with whatever song title came up instead of a serious answer.

MacBook webcam photos from my peers flooded my Facebook timeline. Dumb memes. YouTube videos of eleven-year-old super star singers, clever pets, or Fred.

Somewhere in this 2010's media an array of photos still hot from the MySpace days made its way into the mix. Bright colorful hair, swooping bangs, and Hello Kitty barrettes worn by gorgeous young girls who looked like they would rather scream in your face than be caught dead looking like a "normie" were shared and re-shared by all the coolest kids in my middle school.

As a thirteen-year-old who idolized Peyton from One Tree Hill and romanticized Edward from Twilight, these girls - "scene chicks" - were everything I wanted to be. They were loud, carefree, and the oh-so-sought-after different.

1. The mullet that started it all...

Thirteen and wanting to be different, I strut into the hair salon my mother booked her appointments at. I showed the stylist a picture of big "Emo" bangs and proudly declared that was what I wanted, please, ma'am.

She explained that to get the heaviness of the bang, she'd have to take some hair and pull it up from the back, then cut it. I happily obliged.

After two hours, with my hair blow-dried and straightened, I could see it. I did not have Emo bangs, but I did have something different than any other kid at my school - I had a mullet.

I smiled at the salon lady awkwardly as my mom paid for my haircut. She told me it looked cute. I cried in the bathroom later that night.

My classmates would sing, "I want my mullet back" as I walked down the hall. My seventh grade teacher even got the same haircut as me in an attempt to make me feel better. It was a sweet gesture but definitely only made the bullying worse.

We had family photos the next weekend which is the only photo I have today of this haircut. The Sears' photographer tried to make me feel better as she snapped photos of me and my younger cousins for my grandparents, but I knew: I had some business going on in the front and a big ol' party in the back.

2. Looking very sad with the LuluLemon headband and 20 bobby-pins I used to use in attempt to hide the iconic mullet

After that, I got braces, acne so bad it required a prescription cream, and started wearing reading glasses. I tried to pin my hair back with all its choppy layers as best as I could with headbands and bobby pins. Insecure, I hung out with my friends less. I stayed in at recess and played cards with two other kids, or on the piano in the library. It was a lonely year, but also showed me a lot about true friendship. In fact, one of the people who didn't bully me back then, ended up becoming my long-term boyfriend in adulthood.

Oh, the power of hair and kindness.

3. Grade 9 came along, my hair grew out. I kept the side bangs and dyed my head-mop pink.

My mullet eventually grew out, thankfully, right before high school. My Emo/scene girl dreams remained, though. I woke up 3 hours early every day just to make sure my hair was flat ironed until it was pin-straight like the Emo/scene girls I idolized online. I loved Hayley Williams from Paramore and took major influence from her style choices at fifteen (the first year I was finally allowed to dye my hair.)

My best friend at the time and I bent over her bathroom sink and slathered hot pink Manic Panic all over my head while listening to Mayday Parade from her iPod, docked into a speaker.

It wasn't until after I'd blow-dried my new fuchsia locks, that I remembered an interview I had the next week as a hostess with a fancy restaurant. I loved my hair but I was embarrassed I'd forgotten about the interview, and knew I would definitely would not be getting the job with an Emo girl look. That was the second time I cried about my hair.

Looking back, I was way too young to be so concerned about looking a certain way for a job. I should have just enjoyed living out my Emo dreams and stopped being so damn emo about it.

After that, I tried a couple more colors: purple, red, and blue, namely. I didn't like them nearly as much. I gave up on the funky hair color thing in grade 10. By then tumblr had exploded and a new genre of cool had entered the chat: Hipsters.

4. Still using that straightener!

Pin-straight hair was still cool though, along with side-bangs and feather clips (see #7).

Hipsters were cool - but not too cool. They didn't have to try kind of cool - but they also had to try really hard or risk being called basic by other hipsters. Even though we all read the same John Green books and downloaded the same three Neutral Milk Hotel songs on Limewire; even though we all re-blogged and imitated the same photos on tumblr, we insisted we were different.

If someone called a hipster a hipster, it was detrimental for the hipster in question to deny the allegation - otherwise, they weren't a real hipster.

How exhausting...

But also damn, was it fun.

Some stylistic influences I remember there being for this phase were Panic! At the Disco's album, Pretty.Odd, the band, Never Shout Never, and any remotely artsy looking girl I scrolled past on the Internet.

5. In grade 10, pinned it all up again

In grade 10, I had the amazing opportunity to travel to France on a student exchange. It was an incredible time and while there, I learned to (eventually) embrace my wavy hair. It wasn't by choice at first, though! My hair straightener wouldn't work with the French outlets and my converter didn't support my hair straightener. I was rocking the waves, whether I liked it or not.

At first, I tried to do what I had done with my faithful mullet by pinning it up. I was still a hipster, of course, so I was morally obligated to add a scarf instead of a LuluLemon headband this time around, though.

6. Learning to embrace the waves at sixteen

I eventually got tired of all that insecurity and just embraced my wavy hair.

7. Honorable mention to the feather fad

Does anyone else remember the feather thing or was that just my hometown? Hair dressers started to offer to put these little feather strands in girls' hair that were meant to be cool, different, and a way to add color to your hair without dying it. I always got a blue feather because I wanted to channel Kida from Atlantis vibes.

Can you even see the feather, though? I barely could! But I cherished that feather back in the day.

8. Gave my head a wee shave in grade 11 because why not, I guess?

I downloaded the entirety of both the Tegan & Sara and Ellie Goulding discographies one night. The rest is history.

9. Tried it again in university

I really don't know why I did this a second time around, to be honest. It was fun until...

10. I shaved it way too short one time

Right before an impromptu road trip to Montreal, I tried to clean up my lil shaved patch of hair and went waaay shorter than I intended. I ended up hating it and started the process of letting my hair grow out again. In the meantime...

11. I got really into wearing snap-backs for a while there

*Cue flashbacks of LuluLemon headbands and bandanas*

12. Lilac hair + snap-back action

Pastel colored hair was in. Everyone was still secretly using tumblr. Urban Outfitters and American Apparel were all the rage. And yes, this was the year The Arctic Monkeys was at an all-time cool factor.

13. In my Khaleesi era with the white hair

Oh, how I tried to get my hair that silver-grey-white color that was all over Instagram (tumblr was officially defunct now.) I didn't quite get there, but damn if I didn't pay way too much money at my university campus salon trying.

14. Bonus: Baby Bangs

Alright, this one is before the 2010's but I had to include it because - the bangs, the Charlie's Angels pose, the Cabbage Patch Kid face? The American Eagle sweater? Iconic, frankly.

What are some of your most iconic looks? Let me know in the comments below!