I began reminiscing recently about my early days of body hair removal and it made me wonder what originally motivated me to shave, pluck, depilate, and wax (accidentally once by ripping a bandage from my skin and a large patch of thigh hairs with it). Like other persons who identify as human, I do experience pressures to meet certain Hollywood standards of beauty and I can’t deny that those standards do influence my choices in relation to my appearance. And as much as I push back against the media’s definition of “attractive”/bullshit/not a real thing I do find myself often questioning whether it’s “okay” for me to own the generous bush that I occasionally have (FYI it is 100% more than okay) and then on the flip side if it’s “okay” to not have any kind of bush (FYI it is 100% more than okay).

Every person’s decision in regards to their own body is always the right decision. If you want to go au natural, wonderful. If you’d prefer the hairless route, fantastic. Whatever feels good for you is good for you and no one but you can say otherwise. Many of my pals tell me they like waxing it all away because it makes them feel sexy, confident, and less self-conscious. While other friends tell me they think waxing is the devil incarnate and can’t be bothered with any of that “nonsense.”

I totally understand the reasoning behind each decision. But I continue to wonder: what do I, Jess, really want? Whenever I find myself in the shower shearing my various hedges, I think “Who am I doing this for? Is it for some future dude I want to bang? Is it for the current dude I’m banging? Is it for SOCIETY? Is it for that crazy man on the street who called me an ugly pile of farts? Or is it for me, myself, and I? I think it’s for me… but is it?” These are not easy questions to answer and for many women body hair is a particularly confusing/paradoxical/sensitive subject, probably because it starts affecting us at such a young age and in such an intense way.

I remember the first time I shaved my legs. It was the spring of 1999, when men were scrubs, women were pigeons, and Jonathan Taylor Thomas was MY king of the world. It was the result of a conversation I had before attending a grade seven elementary school dance. I was curling my hair amongst my favourite “Girl Power” besties before we headed to the gymnasium to shake a tail feather to some Chumbawamba when one of my pals said “You know who I found out doesn’t shave yet? Jennifer.” My other two pals exclaimed “Jennifer? No way! I can’t believe it” and I inquired “Shave what? I shave my moustache sometimes.”

They were referring to her legs but at this point I hadn’t thought to trim the stubble on my limbs, because I was too busy grooming my upper lip, which is why I am proud to say it is so thick and lustrous and Magnum P.I.-like today. I had also been putting a razor to my eyebrows since I was 10 thanks to a comment at a birthday party I overheard about a mother’s brows “lookin’ like Groucho Marx.” Although I had no idea who Groucho Marx was at the time and definitely thought they MEANT to say Oscar the Grouch (whose eyebrows were equally plentiful) I knew that I didn’t want to ever be mocked in that way. So I took my mom’s no-name two-blader and sliced away at the Sesame Street-inspired area above my eyes. I realized afterwards that I had potentially gone a bit far ‘cause the next day at school kids were asking me why I looked so surprised about everything.

But I hadn’t developed a feeling of insecurity about my legs until my friends convinced me that any lady with bearded stems wasn’t yet a legit, bona fide lady. She was a mere shaggy baby who hadn’t learned about her grown-up responsibility of pruning her bewhiskered bod. They were young, and naive, and spewing nonsense that they didn’t understand. Their bible was Seventeen magazine which had informed them that if you had two XX chromosomes you couldn’t also possess two armpit fluffs.

I wanted desperately to be the legit, bona fide lady they spoke of. And although my light brown fur was basically invisible to the naked eye I needed it to go. After my final awkward “Kiss from a Rose” slow dance I sprinted home and headed straight into my mother’s bedroom. I aggressively demanded that I be allowed to shave my legs and there would be no ifs, ands, or buts about it. She immediately replied with “Okay” and I immediately replied with “I don’t care what you say. I’m doing it!” I kicked open the bathroom door and proceeded to furiously dry shave my appendages. I now know from experience that dry shaving culminates in the feeling of vague burning/blood stains on the bottoms of couches but at the time I was rather ignorant and thought my calves were dying internally.

Next came the bristles under my arms which I swiftly abolished. And then the big one arrived. The one that I knew would eventually come but still wasn’t prepared for. The legendary, the epic, the terrifying BIG OLD PUBES. The most complex of all the hairs. I swam a lot as a tween and I knew to not garner unwanted attention I should at the very least pare down my bikini area. But I was also aware of the deeper, more EROTIC meaning of its arrival. Did I want a gentleman to one day SEE IT and did I want him to REACT THE WAY HE WOULD NORMALLY REACT TO SEEING SUCH A THING? I did and I did, but I had no clue what kind of reaction that was. I also had no clue when, where, or how that would happen so I primped in preparation for the swimming and not for the unpredictable naked business.

The first time I disposed of all of it, minus what I couldn’t reach in far away crevices, was when I was attending my first house party in high school. At this point I hadn’t even made-out with a non-mirror yet but I wanted to be ready for potential losing of the virginity and thank god I did ‘cause I ALMOST went home with a piece of cake that I couldn’t quite fit into my purse.

In some ways what triggered my body hair removal was potential embarrassment, and a fantasy of making the sweet love, and a longing to finally grow into a non-juvenile, mature, eligible to vote authentic adult WOMAN. Oddly enough I associated hair with childishness and the elimination of it with a coming of age. When in actuality growing my crotch coiffures was the true indication that I was evolving into my future self.

I also suspect that the above-mentioned triggers have not necessarily changed. I mean, yes, I purposely shed my hair often because it does make me feel good, and provocative, and put together. Does that imply that someone who doesn’t do so is NOT put together? Is NOT provocative? Does NOT feel good? Absolutely not. Again, YOU DO YOU AND ONLY YOU. But what I find interesting is truly examining WHY deep down I choose to do it or often not to do it and HOW that desire came to be. Is it purely because it makes me feel good or is there something more? It’s a question I hadn’t ever thought to ask myself and one I still don’t have a definitive answer to. I don’t know that I will ever have the answer but what I do know is that no matter what I decide to do with my hair, it’s the right decision and I should never feel ashamed about it.