What does Generation Z know about fashion anyway?
Want to know how to appear more youthful to members of Generation Z, even if that may not be possible?
Stop responding to e-mails, ditch the skinny jeans and stop parting your hair on the side. Those are the focus of a kerfuffle that’s currently brewing on the TikTok social media platform, pitting Gen Z kiddies against millennials.
TikTok is an app for sharing short videos. I don’t use it, but it’s been around long enough that I know much of its content is lighthearted silliness.
The thing about e-mails? Silly. My own Gen Z daughter doesn’t like to talk on the phone, and I text clumsily, so how else am I to communicate but through my AOL account?
The skinny jeans thing – good riddance. That fashion trend has been replaced by high-waisted, wide leg style that’s not much of an improvement. I tried on a pair; I looked like I was standing in a barrel.
But, wow, this side part thing. After decades of seeing millions of images of beautiful women with their hair swooped to the side, I am now to accept that the center part is the way to go.
If I did feel compelled to part my hair down the middle, it would be the first time in my life. From the time I had hair, I’ve understood that my forehead is among the several main body parts I must always keep covered.
“You have a high forehead,” my mother once told me.
“It’s not a forehead, it’s a fivehead,” my children teased.
In fact, I have a lofty forehead.
When chemotherapy left me bald and with no hair to soften the geometry of my face, I found that my features are not exactly well distributed across the landscape. Once you get past the eyebrows, there’s a whole bunch more acreage up there.
Bangs have saved me. I’ve worn them straight, feathered, fluffy and more recently, side swept. Bangs have to spring from somewhere, though, and because of a cowlick, mine have always come from a side part.
But now, a teeny bit past age 60 and not ready to throw in the fashion towel, I am fixing to take comb to scalp.
But first, what does it take to look good in a center part, anyway?
Long, straight hair, for one. Cher during the Sonny years comes to mind, and so do blonde folk singers from the 60s. A symmetrical face helps, too. The most beautiful faces are symmetrical, so a person such as actor Keira Knightly can make the switch with lovely results.
I did not enjoy the same result.
It felt strange drawing the tip of the comb down the center of my head, like plowing a new field. The cowlick didn’t want to give up its hold, but eventually I’d separated my mop into two factions, pushed my bangs back and, oh dear.
It was forehead for miles. With my hair swept to the sides, I looked like a tall, tall window with elaborate, tie-back curtains, and not in the good way.
There was a time when a high forehead was considered a sign of great beauty and intelligence. Google “Renaissance paintings of women” and you’ll see what I mean. I’m a few centuries tardy. Back then, a high forehead was a sign of having great intelligence and high hopes for life.
I have high hopes that skinny jeans never come back and that my kids will start answering my e-mails.
And the center part? What do Gen Zers know, anyway. I pushed my bangs back down.