[Professional Blog] Hair's the deal

The House of Assembly will be quiet until spring, but there's going to be plenty of debate at my house.

Our youngest member is two and we've let his hair grow. He's only had a couple of trims since birth.

My wife loves our mane man, and so do I, even when his hair is covered in yogurt or pasta sauce. As a guy who started showing signs of male pattern baldness in high school, I'm living vicariously vihair-iously, if you will through my son.

But the lad's lengthy locks is causing some confusion. A lot of people are mistaking him for Alan Doyle just kidding. Actually, strangers are mistaking my boy for a girl.

When it first started happening,

I thought nothing of it and didn't bother correcting people.

Instead, I'd simply call him by name so people would know the difference.

But as his hair gets longer, it's happening more and more, and I'm having a hard time holding my over-bitten tongue and not going all UFC.

And then there are those who know he's a boy and practically demand that we go get his hair cut.

The last thing I want to do is give in, especially to rudeness, but I'm wondering if it's time. And these doubts will cue up deliberation and debate at my house.

I'm not sure if this happens at your place, but at mine this type of thing can escalate into an argument.

And I'm not looking forward to any kind of racket, especially after the last one.

Me: "Can I put an iPad on the credit card?"

Her: "No, you just put a new laptop on it."

Me (a short time later): "I'm thinking about putting an iPad on the credit card. What do you think?"

Her: "I think if you ask me again I'm going to take out ads in The Weekend classifieds and Kijiji. They will read, "FREE: One man. Not a great cleaner or dancer. Falls asleep during every movie. Will wear same shirt 437 days straight if left unattended."

Me: "So, what do you think about the iPad? ... Just joking. iBad." But back to our hairy situation. If we leave the boy's hair long, we're going to have to suck it up and continue listening to strangers mistake him for a girl or have them tell us to get his hair cut. That won't be easy, Weezie.

If we decide to go to the barber, we're caving in to hair pressure. And our little man will no longer have something that seems like part of who he is.

In the grand scheme of things, obviously, the length of his hair doesn't matter. And it's not like the kid is being psychologically damaged because some missus at

Sobeys calls him a girl. He's more concerned with the balloons and ceiling fans.

Whatever we decide, he's too young to really care unless, perhaps, we styled it into a mullet or a pompadour.

Still sadly the girl comments bug me.

But as I put the situation into words, I'm thinking about just letting his hair grow.

I'm not going to tell my wife my position, though. Instead, I'll use it as ammunition in the forthcoming debate.

Me: "You can keep his hair long as long as I can get an iPad." Her (phone in hand): "Hello, Classifieds ..."

Reformed Rogaine addict Steve Bartlett once had long, thick hair. Want to see what it looked like? Take a pen and draw hair on his picture. (But no glasses please.)

Email your drawing to sbartlett@thetelegram.com. You can follow him on Twitter at bartlett_steve.