I cut my hair the other day in a futile gesture of defiance. I had shaved my head for years, maybe a decade or so, before growing it out again about five years ago in a laughable effort to make myself more presentable at job interviews. For a while I enjoyed the duplicitousness of blending into society with a barbershop haircut. However, I disliked the process of my hair growing out, often into a style teetering between homeless chic and deranged, and then the eventual grudging return to the barbershop, where I would have to again endure the inevitable vacuous questions and stale banter. [I swear if that guy had told me one more time that his sister was also a librarian, I would’ve lost it]. In more recent times, I had prevailed upon Em Ell to trim my unruly locks, which she patiently did with admirable skill and steady hands. Each time, though, I declared that the next time I was going to raise the clippers once again and return to my old self. Well, this time I did. On Friday I reached my breaking point.  Pacing the house for hours in a heat-crazed mania, I finally cracked. I yanked the clippers from the closet and in a few short minutes the deed was done. What significance, if any, this has on my present and future life remains to be seen. But I do feel a few degrees better (and cooler).