Boogers on the Wall

Don’t promise your child he or she can do something thinking that they will forget.

They won’t forget.

Several months ago my oldest son begged me to let him shave his head. I got it at the time. It was spring going into summer and most of the boys in his school were starting to sport buzz-cut short dos.

But I didn’t want him to shave his head. Honestly, there isn’t a real great reason why. I had three sort of good reasons:

1. I liked his hair how it was, that may be the best one I could come up with.
2. I told him I didn’t want him to have a constant sunburned scalp.
3. He was scheduled to get baptized into the Church of Jesus-Christ of Latter-day Saints this past July. An event that I would take dozens of photos at…preferably with him with hair.

Those were my reasons.

I was adamant that he couldn’t do it. Then I talked to my husband about it.

Keep in mind that my husband shaves his head. I somehow forgot that at the time. (He started shaving it several years ago and can I just say that he looks good bald?)

Needless to say he came to my son’s defense. What would shaving his hair hurt? It’s not like he wants to rob a bank or light mailboxes on fire.

True. But I still didn’t want to slather his scalp with sunscreen and I definitely wanted him to have hair for his baptism.

I was able to put him off for several months – until this past week. We went to get haircuts and he threw a fit on the way. He reminded me that I promised he could shave his head after his baptism.

Dang. He remembered.

So my good friend trimmed my and my other two boys’ hair and we left my oldest son’s how it was. That night I took some buzzers to his head and left him “bald.”

I wish I had filmed his reaction when he saw himself in the mirror. He laughed while exclaiming, “Oh my gosh.” I don’t think he recognized himself.

I don’t know if he was happy with the results or not. (He wouldn’t let me know if he wasn’t.) Let’s just hope we have a few weeks until school picture day. If not, oh well.

But whether he likes it or not, he’s bald! And I’m OK with it. There are much, much worse things he could be asking to do. Or doing without asking. I need to pick my battles.

Deep down I think he wanted his head shaved because he wants to be like his dad. Which is why it was stupid of me to argue with him going bald.

His dad is the best man I know. I hope he wants to be like him in more ways than one.