Some Sort of Dreadful Pun

Today, my dreadlings are a year old. Happy birthday, little guys!

No actual dreads were set on fire in the making of this birthday candle.

My dreads have been with me through existential crises of varying severity, two very different overseas adventures, two brief experiments with full-time jobs, one disastrous foray into dating, meeting people I'll never forget (and one or two I'd quite like to), working out what I might actually want to do with my life and my linguistics degree, screaming my heart out for two of my favourite bands, one brush with depression, and a whole lot of times when I've been happier than I've ever been in my life.

They started out like this, with one epic movie marathon and two very patient friends.

And all the elastic bands in the world.

I'm a sea monster!

But also a lion!

And then, because apparently we weren't all that good at backcombing, they sort of floofed up and disappeared for a while.

With my White Wine in the Sun people. <3

Frolicking!

A Very Potter Birthday Party.

They gradually unravelled until, at last, they cried out "FIX US!", and lo, Abbi and Paul came to their rescue.

That awkward moment when you leave the house looking like this.

And my dreads approved.

And it only took 14 hours!

My dreads accompanied me on my travels around England and Germany, serving as travel buddies and a pillow and a hindrance to wearing headphones and hats.

Being a yellow bug in Lancaster. My first ever CouchSurfing experience.

Wrestling a map on a windy day in Leipzig. For the record, I totally won.

Hysteria after surviving the claustrophobic terror that is the Völkerschlachtdenkmal.

Lying in a park in Prague.

At the Max Planck Institut, trying to work out how to wear headphones.

They've given me an excuse to dress up as a pirate even more than usual.

Avast!

Menacing child pirates with that deadliest of weapons, the mushy banana.

And they grew and got fluffy and did their own thing, because that's the sort of thing they do.

In Jo'burg with my Welsh friend from Leipzig. The world is strange and awesome.

As Misty for a friend's geek-themed 21st.

And they came with me when I packed my trunk and said goodbye to the circus, and wound up here - after a month's detour - in lovely York.

Abbi and Paul worked their magic again.

ALL THE THINGS.

We look like a university promo pic. "We're so multicultural! Ahahaha!"

They even look good on other people.

And, yes, sometimes I study.

My dreads make me stand out in a crowd. They bring me unwanted attention, and they bring me a whole lot more attention that I actually appreciate. I suspect they make people pay no attention to what my face looks like, so when I cut them one day, I may first go on a crime spree (or the legal, pleasant equivalent - like a random acts of kindness spree!). They make me feel like a lion, and occasionally like a sea monster, and sometimes both at the same time. I accidentally hit people in the face with them, and I feel bad, but at least it's a conversation starter. I have hair that I can decorate for Christmas, and I still get really excited about that. They make me feel cool and different and confident and perfectly capable of taking over the world.

And they remind me that, in the end, they're just my hair, and I can be all those things without them, too.