Up until last week, parting my hair to the right just felt like the natural order of things, like throwing an empty tin can into the recycling bin or washing everything but your bra on laundry day. Then I learned about the debate dividing TikTok and Instagram [1], in which gen Zers were claiming that if you do it any other way but right down the middle, you are, in fact, old as Moses parting the Red Sea. When we polled POPSUGAR editors on their stances, it was confirmed: the side part [2] is indeed a Very Millennial Thing to Do.

Anyway, flash forward to today and my current hair regimen feels more like the meme of a little girl crying [3] into the mirror with the words, "Putting my hair in a middle part after a shower so gen z doesn't call me ugly" at the top. Despite my proud accomplishment of not having caved to any TikTok trend yet, I weirdly wanted to try this elusive style I thought only looked good on people like Kim Kardashian [4] but somehow captured the hearts of youths everywhere. It would become my mission to at least attempt.

Although, let me be clear: this was no easy feat, at least not for someone with a widow's peak that by nature splices my hair slightly to one side, let alone 16+ years of blow-drying my roots into submission of one direction. When I first uploaded a video of my efforts to try the middle part [5] to my Instagram Story, you could tell something looked . . . off. "But look at that volume," my sister responded. "On one side and one side only."

Before: the Side Part

As you can see by this blurry outtake of a recent work video, my hair part dries thisclose to my scalp naturally. Still, I also got some words of encouragement. "Retrain your hair," my friend Nick DMed via voice note on Instagram. He's 24, so obviously I decided to listen to him. "How?" I asked, to which he responded simply: "When it's damp, after you shower, part it down the middle and press it down in both directions. Let it dry. Then keep doing that."

I'm pretty sure I responded in my own muffled voice note: "OK, I'll try," and that I did.

During: the Middle Part

Up until this point, I had been wearing my hair in a middle part for two days and so the natural oils from my scalp weighed down each side swimmingly, but I knew I needed to "retrain" my part with proper damp hair. I took this photo immediately after a shower and blow-dry, and as you can see, the hair at my roots on the left side of my head looked like it was harboring a groundhog or something just below the surface, waiting to pop up from its burrow.

I hit both the left and right side with an equal amount of heat from my hair dryer, smoothed it down with a bristle brush, and decided to sleep on it to help press the style.