Really long hair.

This is my niece, Anna. Anna was born with a full head of dark hair. She got her first hair cut at 6 months old, long before any of mine even had hair.

When Anna was four and in pre-school, her teacher, Miss Dorie, approached my sister and said, "I have to tell you the funniest thing. One of the other moms asked me if you had gotten extensions put in Anna's hair. The mom said, 'That couldn't possibly be her real hair.'"

It is her real hair ... and it is thick all the way down to the very ends! I don't think Anna can even make her fingers touch if she tried to reach them around her own ponytail (making washing, brushing, and styling a little more challenging for the mama!)

There was a girl in my high school named Maryann. Maryann was Hawaiian, beautiful, and had hair to her knees. I can still picture her during P.E. class, running around the track with her hair gently flowing in the breeze behind her, as a row of male students stopped, stood still, heads turning simultaneously as she passed by them in slow motion ... at least I remember it being in slow motion.

I'm not sure what it is that makes really long hair so captivating, but it is. Somehow really long hair seems to glean it's bearer a little extra power - think Samson and Delilah.

Although I do have long hair now, I have never had really long hair. But I have had my share of mishaps at the salon where much too much was cut ... like the time I was in kindergarten and my sister got her long hair cut to her shoulders. I was at a friend's house, my sister showed up at the door and said, "Mom wants to know if you want to get your hair cut in a pixie." I was 5, I had never heard the word pixie, so I said I did.

I didn't like it.