Bad Hair Days
Does anyone like her hair? My hair is drab brown, fine and thin, not straight, not curly, not wavy, not anything in particular. It’s just plain unmanageable, long, short, permed, curled, blown dry, air dried, highlighted or dyed, so I don’t have many good hair days. It’s the first thing I check out when I look at my photo album.
Silly frou-frou hatband with pastel fabric flowers perched on top of long hair, face framed with curly bangs. I was about five and it was the result of mom’s tortuous Saturday night rituals. Bent over the kitchen sink, wash cloth pressed firmly into my eyes, scratchy towel draped over my shoulders, I squirmed while Mom washed and rinsed. De-tangling was agony followed with leaning over Mom’s lap, face down, over the floor heater vent while Mom brushed and brushed for what seemed like hours until it was dry. I would then be sent off to bed with my bangs firmly bobby-pinned in little pinwheels. Sunday mornings I would sit in church mesmerized by my friend Susie’s long blond hair neatly flowing down her back accentuated by the grosgrain ribbon on her broad brimmed hat.
Frizzy bangs sticking out from under another flower-covered hat. What kind of hat was that anyway? It was sort like a three-inch wide headband that dug into the sides of my head above my ears, no hatpins necessary to keep it in place. Anyway I was about six and the frizz was a result one of Mom’s home perms. At least I didn’t have to succumb to the bobby pin treatment for a while.
Long hair frizzed at the ends, curly bangs, blue glasses. When I was seven I needed glasses. My best friend, Lori had these really neat red and white striped glasses and she wore her hair in a ponytail. I always wanted my hair in a ponytail but mom insisted, “you don’t have the right shape face to do that.” Somehow I figured that if I got glasses just like Lori’s maybe then I could wear a ponytail. “No, that will only make it worse,” was mom’s reaction as she convinced me that the light blue framed glasses would match and draw attention to my best feature, my eyes.
Long ringlets. Grandma coaxed my hair into ringlets a few times until I was about nine years old. The curls lasted just long enough for Mom to grab the camera for a quick picture. Then my sister was born. By the time she was two she had beautiful long curly hair and Grandma would spend hours arranging her perfect ringlets. I still remember the satisfaction I felt the day my sister found a pair of scissors and cut off the two front ringlets. Mom was horrified.
The poodle. The summer when I was eleven years old my friend Sandy got her long hair cut short and the lady down the street gave her a poodle perm. I relentlessly begged until Mom finally agreed I could have one too. Sandy led me up the rickety wooden steps to the back porch where the lady did the perms. It must have been near 100 humid degrees the day I spent the entire afternoon smelling the sweaty armpits of my hairdresser. She cut my hair, wrapped sections in little paper squares, wound it tightly into small pink plastic curlers, applied a stinky ammonia solution, and checked for curls half a dozen times. After a couple more rinses and solutions and a thorough drying under the hot air blasts of the clunky silver hair dryer, the rollers were removed to reveal tight kinky curls. I didn’t look at all like Sandy and mom was so shocked she hid her camera for months. This school picture was taken about three months later.
The pageboy. My friend Carla at the summer cabins always wore her hair in a perfect pageboy. We were probably about twelve the day she cut my hair. She said she knew exactly how, then she couldn’t figure out why my hair flipped up instead of down. Mom tried to fix it but ended up taking me to a hairdresser for a very short haircut.
Bouffant. Another permanent, resulting in frizz that had to be tamed by sleeping on various sized bristled rollers every night, followed by arduous ratting and lots of Aquanet extra hold hairspray to keep it in place for most of the day. That is if it didn’t rain, and if we didn’t have to take showers at gym class.
Shoulder length, dyed blond: My high school senior picture is still my favorite photo. Every hair is in place. It looks like a simple hairdo but actually required sleeping on huge bristled rollers, teasing into place, and a quick fluff up just before the flash of the camera. Two months after graduation I chopped my hair off to resemble Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music.
Hairpiece. My friend Janet wore her hair to work this way everyday. “It’s easy. Just pin up your hair, plop on the hair piece and voila!” she said. EASY was the magic word. We went shopping, I got a hairpiece, and I wore it everyday for over a year. It was easy but washing it out every week and balancing it on the Styrofoam head to style it was another matter. At least I could now nestle deeply into my pillow each night while the Styrofoam head wore the huge bristled rollers.
The shag. The worse cut ever. It was one of those cuts were people say simply “Oh you got your hair cut.” The obvious “rolling of the eyes” kind of look said it all. Uncle Mac started to even out my hair a little bit each month until eventually it was all one length and looked fairly decent.
New kind of permanent. Chasing around toddlers, I needed simplicity. My hairdresser suggested there was great new permanent out that would add just a little extra body. And I believed her. The kids squealed with laughter and my husband came home from work and made a remark about a light socket. I was in tears. I changed hairdressers.
Long and flowing. Running years brought back the long hair just for the luxurious feel of it blowing in the wind. I really didn’t care what it looked like and I bet mom rolled over in her grave every time I pulled it back into a pony tail.
Short short short. Approaching middle age, backpacking became my next obsession. Yes, you read right – middle age – the time of life when most people hang up their backpacks. Not me, I was going to climb mountains. And I needed short hair to do it. Real short hair. I hid it under a broad brimmed floppy hiking hat. My family wondered if I was becoming a Lesbian. And then a Lesbian tried to pick me up. I started to grow my hair out once again.
Short again. When I turned 50 I went to a new hairdresser (okay, I change hairdressers every couple of years). But, this new hairdresser sat me in the chair, ran her fingers through what was by this time an unruly medium length mess, and shook her head a couple of times. I don’t know why I didn’t run when she commented, “You know when we get older and things start falling, it’s a good idea to cut our hair shorter. It kind of uplifts things.” Instead, I humbly admitted she was right. I was getting old. Things were falling. My hair was a disaster. “Okay, do what you think is right,” I said. You can see the result below.... on second thought I wouldn't want to scare you away with that. Maybe some other time.
Today. I hide from cameras. My hair is once again medium length and now sprinkled with gray. I haven’t had a hair cut in four months. Last time I went to the salon, my hairdresser suggested “just a bit of body perm and some highlights would make you look much younger” . . . . . Thank you, but I have earned these gray hairs and I know what perms do to me.
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