Punk Rock Articles | I’m cutting off my dread locks today

I’m cutting off my dread locks today

By Johnny Skate Punk Johnny Before

I’m cutting off my dread locks today. I just felt it was time. They have become heavy. They pull at my scalp. When I pull them back and tie them up, they pull my forehead back in a very uncomfortable way. They have become uncomfortable. It’s time for us to part ways.

As Robert Crosby sings in “Almost Cut My Hair”, I felt like I owe them someone. That song always goes through my head whenever I’ve had the thought of ending what has become a nine-year saga of discovery and transformation. But I now have a desire to end this part of my life and start another era. A renewal.

I started growing my dreads after my first year in Antarctica. I was still suffering from the distress of an unfulfilling career and a disaster of a relationship. My move to the Ice told me that things were going to be different in a good way. I could be who I was supposed to be in my heart. My heart told me that it was time to let my hair do what it naturally does and through such action, I would be able to discover who I really was.

I think I have accomplished what I set out to do by growing my hair. I have been curious about dread locks from my first discoveries that Egyptian Pharaohs have been found mummified with a black man’s dread knots, intact. I have always been curious about the majesty and the heritage of it all. Dread Locks are the natural state of a black persons hair. I wanted to know that image. I have always involuntarily been at the point in the inclusion of black people in certain sectors of society, and the growth of my hair may have had something to do with this as well. I don’t know if it’s the right thing to do or not, but pushing the point of Johnny After

“judging a person on the content of their character, not the color of their skin” to a new level was part of it. I want this society to know that in this 21st century, we will have to tolerate everyone and look past many barriers bigger than a man’s hair length and style in order for us to collectively enjoy affluence, joy and laughter. If I did not make this point with you, I hope that my actions at least ignited conversation and thought.

But the time has come to archive this record of my life. It is time to create a new reality, a new evolution that is John Powell.

I want all to understand this: Cutting my hair is not an act of conformity. If anyone believes that the pressures of employment, society or the need to fit in are behind my actions, they are making a big mistake. This is my decision alone. I am still the same guy, there’s just less hair to get through.

I want to thank my best friend, Michael Davis for this kickin’ haircut to start the new chapter in my life.

Here y’go…….Deal wit’ it!

JP