Girls with curly hair are more likely to be nonconformists. Rebels even. That’s what my friend says, and her theory’s worth considering.

From early childhood, curly-headed girls struggle to restrain their hair, to make their hair conform to whatever fashion dictates. They carefully pat it, tug at it, smooth it, moisten it—and SPROING! It does whatever the hell it wants.

The mom yells as you go out the door: Comb your hair!

What does she think you’ve been doing the last 20 minutes?

A good girl has neatly trimmed bangs and her hair hangs obediently to the shoulders. But you never look like that. No matter the temperament you were born with, how neat, sweet and compulsive you might be at heart, you look messy. A wild girl. Frowzy even.

When you get yelled at and teased for something you can’t control, it undermines trust in the fairness of the system. You try harder and harder to get your hair to behave and finally give up. At an early age, you’ve already experienced futility. You take up smoking, drinking and rambunctious thinking. You flirt outrageously with boys. You give up control over your life.

My friend and I think that the curly-head phenomenon affects guys less because they always have the option to just keep their hair very short. To fuhgedaboutit. But girls even with short hair are still supposed to look like Dorothy Hammill or Uma Thurman or Kate Moss. Long hair—Jennifer Aniston. Im-possible!

Now, there are sisters with African heritage who will think they have hair issues—but please—they are somewhat sheltered from this phenom. They are more likely to have understanding moms with similarly energetic hair. They are more likely to have lovely hair traditions to celebrate. Put a pale-skinned curly-headed sister in corn rows and she looks like a wistful wannabe. Like an American dude who talks up a British accent to impress the ladies. Such a sham.

I just watched the lowering sun light up my red leather shoes and the red interior of my guitar case. As I played, my gaze wandered to the mirror and I saw a woman, her recently shorn hair like an unpruned shrub or that of an adolescent lion. I sighed and thought of my friend.

‘^&*% it!’ a girl thinks as she stares in the glass. ‘^&*% everything!’ And soon she’s telling presidents, popes and patriots where they can get off.