DECATUR - In the 1980s, it seemed as if everybody rocked the mullet. Music legend David Bowie did it. Hockey superstar Wayne Gretzky did it. Heartthrob Patrick Swayze did it, too.

Hair was shorter in the front and longer in the back, then. It was the heyday of the 'do. But the hairstyle, with countless Web sites devoted to lampooning it, has become somewhat of a pop culture phenomenon since then. It doesn't seem as if it will disappear any time soon.

A few area residents shared the history behind their hairstyles and decisions to defy coiffure convention.

Lucy Brownlee, 44, owner of Lucy's Airbrush and Sign Store, cuts her own hair, which has a multitude of layers on the top and sides and longer locks in the back.

"Some of the younger guys like to tease me, and they call it a mullet. But really, I don't think my hair is a mullet because I don't have one length," Brownlee said. "I have layers in the back."

If anything, Brownlee's hair has its roots in rock 'n' roll.

"I think my hairstyle is really similar to David Bowie's 'Diamond Dogs' album cover," she said.

Brownlee's hairstyle was fashioned more out of necessity than anything else. It grows slowly and is so fine that it breaks off easily.

"When I was a kid, all I wanted was long hair like the other girls, and it took me until sixth grade to grow my hair to shoulder length," she said. "And then, everybody went to short hairstyles, and I cut my hair, and it would never grow back again."

Brownlee has worn her hair in the same style for 15 years. Her fashion sense, which she described as, "eclectic and hippie at the same time," reflects her identity as an artist and a colorful free spirit.

"The person that I am is that I have never cared what society perceives as being appropriate," she said.

In the early '80s, Brownlee wore her hair in a bright red Mohawk.

"It was so short on the side you could see my scalp," she said with a nostalgic smile.

Jason Eddinger, 36, a union painter and owner of Sure Shine, an aluminum polishing and chroming business, prides himself on being different. For a long time, he said, his unique personality and creativity have manifested themselves in his hair.

Since having what he would consider a true mullet as a teenager in the '80s, Eddinger said, he has taken on a variety of looks. These days, he sports a blue Mohawk, earning him the nickname of "angelfish" from his stepdaughter, Bianca Eddinger, 12.

"When I met him, he just had regular, spiked brown hair and the long goatee," said his wife, Bobbi Eddinger, 30. "That's it."

The couple has been married for nine years. Several years into their marriage, Eddinger shaved his hair into a Mohawk.

"The first time he did the Mohawk, I went next door and just bawled to my mother-in-law, just because of his hair," she said.

He's shaved his hair, grown it out, dyed it to look like calico and done all sorts of things to it, his wife said, but she's grown accustomed to his changing hairstyles.

"I actually like it," she said. "You know what I think I like more is just the reaction that people give us because he's actually a very intelligent, very outgoing, sociable person. And you know, at first, when they look at him, they just put him in the category of, 'Oh, he's some kind of freak.' "

Jason Eddinger's mother, Robin Eddinger, said she doesn't mind the unconventional hairstyles her son has chosen over the years.

"If that's the worst thing he was going to do, then I didn't have a problem with it," she said.

She produced a couple photos of what she calls her son's "Kirk Cameron phase."

"So he just had this mullet, but it was like, curly back here," she said, gesturing to the nape of her neck. "You know, and it was short in the front and then the little mullet in the back."

Eddinger is comfortable in his own skin and happy with the blue stripe going across his scalp. He said it reflects his individuality and identity as an artist. Embracing convention to gain the acceptance of his critics is just not something Eddinger plans to do.

"That's the thing, is I could take this, shave everything off, let it grow out a couple three days and just get a nice little flattop and put some horn-rimmed glasses on, and that'd be a little goofball," he said.

Devin Taylor, 21, has been wearing her hair in a "fashion mullet" for about a year. Before that, the Eastern Illinois University English major's hair was shoulder length.

"It's not meant to look like an actual haircut," she said. "It's meant to look like it was done in the dark by yourself."

Taylor's hair, which she gets done at a J.C. Penney salon, is a layered, asymmetrical cut with the shortest layers in the front.

"I plan on getting more layers put in this and making it into an even cooler mullet, I guess," Taylor said.

After graduating in the fall with a minor in anthropology, Taylor plans to study linguistics in graduate school to fulfill her dream of working for the CIA.

"But I don't know if they'll let me with certain body modifications," she said.

Taylor said she feels people unfairly apply a set of stereotypes to her because of her hair. But that often happens when people assert their uniqueness, she said.

"Yes, they do open themselves up to judgment, but they may not do it for that reason," she said of others who defy fashion norms. "They may do it because they want to, because they feel like some kind of body modification is going to make them feel more beautiful or more attractive to someone, and I personally don't think people should be criticized for things like that."

Annie Getsinger can be reached at agetsinger@herald-review.com or 421-6968.