A (Hair) Cut below the Rest

Finally... At last... After a long long time, after years of being scared of conflict, I have finally ended being the cynosure of a conflict. And what better place to be in a conflict than at home, what better people to be in conflict than your best friends, who also are your roommates. It's a different potpourri of feelings - anger, conflict, pain, awkwardness, embarrasment, pride, ego - all fighting for dominance within you.
For a long long time, I had taken pride in my complete non-display of ego. I found out that this pride was completely misplaced, cos within the conscious layer of "egolessness", there was a big big ego lurking, just dormant. I am trying to fight against it, to rise above it, but I am still scared of conflicts. I give in.
The whole point of the conflict is very silly if you talk about it. Which I guess it would have been, among friends, and friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends. But then I guess no body knows what the point of the conflict was. That's because I told nobody. All that people talk of would be how XYZ got very angry that his hair cut was commented upon. And bam, you see everybody coming upto XYZ, and telling him how great his hair cut is.
I want to tell people, in fact not people but just my closest friends that the anger was not about the hair cut. It was something that was deep inside, something that needed a vent for expression, some frustration that looked for an escape and all it could find for expressing itself was some innocuous comment on a stupid hair cut.
The point of the conflict was more about finding acceptance for what you are. No one cares what the world thinks about you. But you would expect that your friends see what the world doesn't see. That your friends respect you and accept you for what you are. And that they don't judge you by their standards. Did I miss that feeling among my friends? May be I did. May be it was there, may be it wasn't. But you would see the world green when you are wearing green goggles. And then things got blown... out of proportion, and out of context, and all the emotions played their part in the drama.
But now, dents have been made, things have been said, tempers have been flared, and people have been hurt. May be it's difficult to get back to things as they were. But I'm sure that if people care enough, things will get better. Do I care enough? I hope so. But I expect people to look beyond and try to understand. For if they don't, what was all the association and friendship worth? But if I don't explain myself right, what's my freedom with my friends worth? Well, it all comes down to the question of ego. And as I said, I'm still fighting. And right now, I'm not winning.