More weather issues last week. Only this time, it was not the threat of hurricanes, earthquakes, or even power loss that occupied my thoughts. After a week of unending rain, rain that soaked tree roots and caused still more trees to fall and still more power outages, rain that made everything feel moldy and mildew and damp inside and out, like you’re growing mushrooms, rain that kept the skies gray and moods even grayer, I had the worst rain-related issue of all.
I had frizzy hair.
A week before the floods started I had gotten a great new haircut. New layers, a new me. After years of seeing the same hairdresser, the one in the fancy salon that I swore I would never leave, I had taken my daughter to the local hair salon for her annual trim. As we were waiting for her appointment, a woman about my age walked up to the cash register to pay. She had a fabulous new style, and all at once, I knew I was ready to make a big change.
I snuck back to the salon later that afternoon and the owner gave me my new cut. Layers. Shorter. Flattering. And half the price of the fancy place I’ve been patronizing for so long. I was giddy with joy. Because, as we all know, our hair is a key reflection of our mental state. If we’re not happy with our hair, we’re just not happy. And this new cut made me happy.
But any cut, at least for me, is only as good as the weather. So a few days later, during the Week of the Unending Rains, as I sat with my unruly, frizzy curls and mop of rain hair fouling my mood, I tried to explain this concept to a friend – a man. Needless to say, he just didn’t get it.
Of course not. For the most part, men’s hair does not rule their emotional state. It’s short. It’s manageable. Sometimes, after the cruel ravages of middle age, it doesn’t even exist much anymore (illustration 1: my husband, who now simply buzzes off what little hair he has left every couple of weeks. I think it looks great, much more so than if he tried to hide the problem, but it certainly doesn’t give him any insight into my hair issues.)
I have been having hair issues as long as I can remember. They started when I was still in elementary school, and my hair was long and straight and blonde. But what I knew deep down inside is that I was meant to have raven dark hair and to sport a mass of stupendous curls.
So I tied my tresses up with rags and tried to make rag curls. Which immediately fell out. And I slept with multiple braids to try to crimp my hair. Which immediately fell out. And the corn rows that the African American girls in my 5th grade class tried to weave into my head? They immediately fell out.
As I lumbered toward adolescence, evil hormones transformed my hair from pin-straight to coarse and frizzy and unmanageable, with still nary a curl in sight. It was at this time that Dorothy Hammill, the Olympic winning figure skater, was dominating the hair headlines with her smooth Wedge. Needless to say, my now coarser head was not the ideal setting for that particular haircut.
Then, in 7th grade, the only thing that could make me happy was to have … the Farrah. We all knew that with those wings, we would have perfect lives.
That didn’t work out so well either.
So, when I reached the age of reason, 15 and a junior in high school, and I no longer wanted to blow dry my hair -- I turned to chemicals. 1970s-era permanents. Which endowed me with a large, glorious, damaged, frizzy mop of a head that I proudly wore for a couple of years. I imagined I looked bohemian and exotic. In retrospect, I think I resembled circus clown. With glasses.
Since those days, I have weathered many hair adventures. A badly-advised really short cut on my way to my college term in France in 1982.Henna experiments in my 20s. Angular, asymmetrical cuts in the 90s. Short bobs, buzzed up the neck. A couple of helmet-head cuts when I first moved to conservative-haired Washington. A coloring job gone wrong (orange, if you must know.) Fortunately, they all eventually grew out.
For the past 16 years, ever since I became a mom, my hair mantra has been, by necessity, let it be simple and easy to care for. So I have worn my hair all one length and long-ish. Although I never achieved either the exotic, curly look or even the sleek, professional look for which I sometimes longed, I have been satisfied. The flat iron became my best friend.
And then, I stepped into that salon where my daughter got her haircut. The familiar wave of hair envy crept into my brain. I could change my look! I could reinvent myself! I could be beautiful! And so I bit.
I do love my new cut. It’s versatile, allowing me to wear my hair straight and layered and more mature looking or curly and cute. I think I have found the answer to my mid-life hair issues … at least for now.
Now if I could only get my 12-year-old daughter, who has the most beautiful, fabulous curls you can imagine, to stop putting her hair up in a bun and begging me to take her in to get it blown out straight …
But I guess it’s inevitable - the hair is always greener on the other side of the fence. Except when you color it orange.
Photo by AndyRobertsPhotos via Flickr.
Comments