This past Monday, our son Sholom turned three years old and got his very first haircut. Although, our morning routine will be now be one step shorter I wont have to brush his hair it was with wistfulness that I approached that day.
The third birthday represents a significant developmental stage in a childs life. It is a time when a baby becomes an individuated child; when he becomes more self-aware and self-sufficient. At the age of three a child can think in sentences, comprehend a story, and most importantly, the child becomes aware of his own identity and that of the people around him. Babyhood has now ended, and this new milestone marks the beginning of the childs formalized Jewish education.
For a boy, the celebration that marks this new phase of his life is called an Upshernish (Yiddish lit. shearing off) - his first haircut. Until this age, his hair grows untouched. At the Upshernish his hair is cut, but his peyot (sidelocks) remain. From this time onward, the child is encouraged to wear a kippah and tzitzit.
At an Upshernish, it is customary to dip Aleph-bet letters into honey and give them to the child to taste, symbolizing the sweetness of learning. Instead, we gave Sholom cookies in the shape of the Aleph-bet letters. He licked off the icing and looked at us with sparkling eyes as if to say, "I am a big boy now!"
As Sholoms baby locks were shorn off, it was as though we were removing his last vestige of 'baby-life' and launching him toward maturation. After his hair was all cut, we made a circle around Sholom and danced. Peering into the mirror and seeing his big boy haircut for the first time, he proclaimed, "I'm like my big brother now!"
We saved one lock for posterity and mailed the rest to Locks for Love, an organization that makes wigs for children who lost their hair to cancer. It felt good to know that someone else will benefit from Sholom's Upsherin.
For these next few days, I keep staring at Sholom, who suddenly looks older.
My baby is now gone, replaced by a big boy. I promise myself to savor this next
stage of growth and development...pretty soon hell be right where his oldest
brother is, asking to get his drivers permit.