The Hair Shirt

As a fashion photographer I work with a lot of young people. I too was once an enthusiastic and bouncy youngster. But alas, time marches on and now I’m what we refer to (in Fashionland anyway) as a dinosaur. Not that I mind really. Dinosaurs are sort of cool. Or at least that's what I tell myself when sauntering into a studio full of collagen-rich colleagues born in the year 2000 or later. The only problem with the age difference between me and my co-workers is the references that I habitually use. “I want her hair to look just like Jan's in The Brady Bunch,” I will direct a twenty-something up-and-coming hair stylist while running my hands through our model’s long and silky hair. “Like who?” they will say, obviously stumped. 

I use all sorts of "ancient" references to instruct my crew on the feeling we are going for in any given photo shoot. “Her makeup should have that Tippi Hedren in The Birds vibe,” I will announce to a room full of blank stares.  

Another area where the age gap is evident is music. As the photographer, I control the day’s playlist. Or at least I did until last month when I put on Duran Duran’s greatest hits. Our stylist perked up on hearing the eighties style glam rock pouring through the studio’s speakers. “Oh I like this. Who is it?”

“It's Duran Duran,” I informed her.

“Oh - I think my dad likes them,” she said - oblivious to how that might affect me. “Aren't they like a bunch of English dudes who you can tell used to be hot but now they're just old?” she asked me. I felt all the vim and vigor seep right out of my body, through my feet and into the poured concrete floor, never to return. “Yes,” I sighed, defeated by time, “that's them.” Now I let “the kids” put on whatever the hell they want - the daily D.J. duty resting on the sprightly shoulders of one of the under 30s.

It was last month while working on a shoot that I felt the need to educate my crew, not about some actress or music reference of yore, but all about penitents in the Catholic religion.

Our model on this shoot was a very unhappy camper. This particular job was not difficult, but based on her attitude you would have thought I was asking her to stand stark naked on top of a cold and blustery mountain while juggling pumpkins. I was not. But no matter what I did or said or offered this young nymph, I could not - or should I say we could not (as by mid-day the whole crew was in on the mission) cheer this girl up. 

At around three o'clock as our model (lets call her Svetlana) went outside to smoke yet another cigarette, I turned to the stylist and said “she's so miserable. Are you sure she’s not wearing a hair shirt underneath these outfits?”

“A what?” she asked.

“A hair shirt,” I responded. 

“What's a hair shirt?” she asked, obviously confused.

"How can you be almost thirty and not know what a hair shirt is?” I admonished her. Then I threw it out to the crew of about fifteen. “Who here knows what a hair shirt is?” The question boomed around the walls of the vast studio space - but there was not a peep of recognition.

“Please. Don't keep us in suspense any longer,” one of my assistants chirped sarcastically. “You're going to tell us anyway,” he laughed, knowing how I like to soapbox on important factoids I believe my crew should know.

“Gather ‘round folks,” I said to no one in particular. “A hair shirt is a shirt made of like a really coarse and prickly material. It was worn by Catholics as a form of penance. It’s a form of self-flagellation.”

“Ugh…and…why?” the manicurist asked.

“Stand by kids,” I muttered, searching on my phone. “Ahhh - here it is,” I announced triumphantly, reading them all some AI facts. “During the early ages of Christianity the hair shirt, also known as a cilice or sackcloth, was used as a means of bodily mortification. It is worn next to the skin to provide maximum discomfort which helps to serve as physical proof of one's faith and as a means to resist temptation. Hair shirts are used to “mortify the flesh.” This practice is rooted in early Christian asceticism. The discomfort is intended to help focus the wearer on spiritual matters and to offer a form of self-inflicted suffering as an expression of repentance and devotion.”

“Oh look!” one of the crew members (with those speedy fingers that youth offers) shouted in apparent glee from where she was sitting behind the large studio desktop, “you can buy handmade hair shirts on Etsy!”

We all crowded around the computer and gazed appreciatively at the wild assortment of hair shirts available for sale on the internet. There is quite a selection to choose from. Some are made from the classic goat hair of course, others from an itchy sort of bark, something that looks like a Brillo pad, and there’s even one made from barbed wire. “Wow!” the stylist enthused, “they come with discomfort levels too! The highest pain level seems to be a five…which one will you get?” she teased me as we perused the hair shirt offerings together. 

“I don't need to buy one,” I informed her, “I have my mind. My mind is my own personal hair shirt. It tortures me so.” 

We laughed and got back to work. Svetlana did indeed perk up and behave herself until 7 p.m. when we wrapped for the day. By 7:30 I was left alone in the studio to finish up my edits from the day’s work. I walked over to the large desktop computer where dozens of hair shirts were still being displayed in all their gruesome glory. 

As I scrolled mindlessly, amazed and appalled that people in 2025 are still wearing hair shirts, I experienced a wonderful sort of epiphany. 

My mind was indeed my hair shirt for years. Basically it tortured me on a daily basis. And the only way I could find to get in there and scratch that chronic itch was by ingesting drugs and alcohol. But now I’m sober and that “black out to make it shut up” option is no longer tempting to me. 

In fact, getting sober forced me to stand up and face my hair shirt of a mind. Part of getting sober in a twelve-step program is practicing the eleventh step which encourages prayer and meditation. And it is by meditating that I can step away from my mind and just watch it as an observer. In that way it has less control over me. Some days, even now, my mind can feel like a hair shirt. And when that happens I can sit in silence and watch it. I even speak to it sometimes. “Man! You're really torturing me today,” I tell it, knowing that in time that state of mind will change, as all things eventually do. 

I envision one of my co-workers heading home to a shared loft in Bushwick where one of her multi-pierced heavily tattooed roommates will ask her how her day was. “It was weird,” I imagine her saying as she dumps her bags and heads to the fridge. “Our model was sort of impossible at first and the photographer was some old lady who was ranting and raving about something called a ‘hair shirt.’ But the pictures were nice so it actually turned out to be a pretty good day.”