Suzanne Harrington: I’ve just conducted a one-woman experiment — I got a buzz cut

Suzanne Harrington: "Having a fuzzy skull and wonky dye job feel like a tiny, personal act of dissent. Being invisible feels powerful."

Ladies, here’s a free tip. If you want to instantly disappear, no need for a witness protection programme, or Harry Potter’s cloak of invisibility — simply cut off all your hair. Not to the shiny-scalped extent of Emma Stone in Bugonia — such deliberate baldness on a woman (although never a man) generally elicits shrieks of horror, unless you’re Sinéad, or the lead singer of Skunk Anansie.

No. Just do a straightforward buzz cut. A close crop. To vanish in plain sight, all you need are some clippers and a steady hand. Get rid of your hair, and people will no longer see you. You could rob the Louvre and nobody would notice.

I’ve just conducted a one-woman experiment, non-funded and non peer-reviewed, but conclusive. Hair is what makes you a lady.

For 30-plus years, I’ve had lady-length hair, dyed an unnatural shade of red (see byline photo). 

I still engaged in regular hair admin: the bulk-buying of red dye, the wonky DIY fringe trims, the annual appointment.

Obviously, this required upkeep — DIY dyeing in the bathroom sink, red splashes all over white porcelain like a nosebleed, and cash money once a year for a professional tidy-up... the way you’d pay a man to do the hedge.

Admittedly this is far less upkeep than getting your highlights done in a salon every two months for the price of a business-class flight to Sydney, yet I still engaged in regular hair admin: the bulk-buying of red dye, the wonky DIY fringe trims, the annual appointment. All part of being a lady, right? Lady tax, if you will.

But then, middle age happened. As the oestrogen drained from my body, so too did my ability to facilitate anything needy, from pets and children to hair care. Luckily, the oestrogen draining coincided with the children adulting, and the ancient beloved dog dying, which left me with nothing needier than my actual hair.

Even that proved too much. With barber clippers from Amazon and box dye from Boots, I shaved my head and dyed the stubble silver. I say silver — the picture on the box promised a perfect moon-coloured silver, which translated to brassy nicotine in real life, but that’s the joy of a buzz cut. If it goes wrong, you just shave it off again. A kind of tonsorial Etch-a-Sketch. 

No more murder scenes in the bathroom. No more tedious hair care. Just a stubbly skull, wipe-cleanable as a fuzzy billiard ball.

And with that, say hello to the cloak of lady invisibility. Hello to sudden assumptions about your sexual orientation doing some kind of mid-life handbrake turn. Also hello to earnest questions about health. Because the moment you stop doing performative femininity via your hair, you’re automatically either a lesbian, or undergoing chemo, or a lesbian undergoing chemo.

Why else would you have no hair, if not making a statement, voluntarily, about your sexual preference, or involuntarily about your health status?

It’s like when you say no-thanks to an alcoholic drink and everyone assumes you’re either driving, pregnant, or on antibiotics. Why would you not have a drink, and why, if you’re a woman, would you not have hair?

In this era of MAGA hair — a sort of fascistic Farrah Fawcett aesthetic, flicked and flowing and fetishised, accompanied by the identikit MAGA face, plumped and sculpted like some sinister Barbie production line — Trumpy tradwives embody a conformist, ersatz femininity. Big hair is back, but in a bad way.

Which makes having a fuzzy skull and wonky dye job feel like a tiny, personal act of dissent. Being invisible feels powerful.

“Women don’t owe you pretty,” quips my daughter.

“Yes they do,” sobs my (male) partner. “Yes, you bloody well do. When are you going to let it grow back?”