Britney's Meltdown

Posted at 11:01 AM ET, 02/20/2007Parsing Britney's MeltdownA bald Britney. (AFP/Getty Images) Photo Gallery: Britney's Changing LookUnless you spent the long weekend in a sensory deprivation chamber, you know Britney Spears -- in full view of a horde of photographers -- wandered into a neighborhood hair salon in California on Friday night and proceeded to shave her head. Images of a bald Britney have been burned into our retinas, joining Michael Jackson's balcony baby dangle, Tom Cruise's couch jumping and Mel Gibson's mug shot in the celebrity meltdown hall of fame.Mothers who once accompanied teenyboppers to Spears's concerts are faced with the daunting task of turning this trainwreck into a life lesson. Grown men who slavered over the post-Disney/pre-preggo Brit just a couple of years ago have now dropped her from their top five. And the AARP crowd -- more accustomed to stars who self-destruct the old-fashioned way -- are risking whiplash with the amount of "what is this world coming to?" head-shaking going on.Spears's Web site is no help. Suddenly, the pop tart -- who has a habit of baring her soul online -- has no cryptic poetry, no uncomfortable TMI "feelings" to share, no finger pointing for her recent slide into the deep end. The now familiar gilt-frame -- that as recently as December relayed to us Britney's oops-I-did-it apology for her lost weekend (well, week really) with Paris Hilton -- remains empty, containing only a one-line placeholder to let us know that something will be there sometime in the future.And, thus far, Spears is -- for better or for worse -- shunning Matt Lauer and the rest of the newshounds (Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer, Oprah) no doubt jockeying to land a very special interview with her.In fact, the last word we had directly from Spears was that December Web message (linked above), the one where Britney dismissed her extreme partying as merely making up for lost time and vowing to work hard in the new year on her image and music. I guess that didn't quite work out for her.I've had my fun with Britney here (this piece's co-authoress recently commented: "If only we'd included "shave your head, we'd be sitting pretty right about now") and, truth be told, will probably continue to do so -- there's just something about a fallen pop princess shaving her head that defies being taken too seriously. Of course, this recent episode certainly qualifies as one of the biggest red flags I've ever seen, but to quote someone who once got to the point much quicker than I did: If we didn't laugh, we'd cry.Still, my heart aches for this woman who grew up (or, more accurately, failed to grow up) in the spotlight, pushed on stage and into an early sexuality -- taught that looks equal talent. At 25 (so young) she's past her pop prime, a mother of two, divorcing and scorned by the public that once embraced her.Nothing like shaving one's head, spontaneous tattoos and hard partying to deface one's self image.It's hard not to draw parallels to Anna Nicole Smith -- another blonde bombshell who came unglued publicly and perished before finding help. A former assistant recently said she hopes Britney hits bottom soon and gets that help so she can return to her former, ambitious self.Me, I hope she gets the help she needs to find out who she