I’m not entirely sure why but after my last day of work before leaving to move to a yurt and start life as a full time parent, I quit cutting my hair. On that same day I threw away my razor and shaving cream. In some ways it felt as if, just as one puts on a white shirt and tie to go to the office, I was putting on the uniform I needed to go live in the woods without electricity, plumbing, or a job.

It didn’t take long before I looked pretty shaggy. My hair was annoyingly long and always in my eyes and my beard itched like crazy.

But after a few weeks it got long enough that it wasn’t too annoying

After a few months my hair was long enough that it was fully out of my face.

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On the other hand, I found myself in a new situation. People looked at me in a whole new way. One day, not long before we left the yurt, a couple of guys delivered an order of firewood to us. Together we unloaded their truck and stacked a cord of wood. At the end the driver turned to me and said “OK now – where’s your pipe?”

“What?” I asked.

“You know, where’s your pipe. We finished the job and now we’re going to smoke up a bit.”

As someone who never owned a pipe, rolling papers, or a bong, I realized then that I was wearing the wrong uniform and soon after found my way back to the much less grizzly look I have today.