“There ain’t no words for the beauty, the splendor, the wonder of my hair, hair, hair hair…”[HAIR, by the Cowsills plays softly, ominously, in the background…]
I have never awakened to find my hair has turned hot pink over night, but I did wake up as Marilyn once…
When I was still a blushing widow the first time, I discovered how quickly my stress translated into gray. Gray skin, gray clothing, gray hair…I was depressing to look at. Remember the scene in My Big Fat Greek Wedding where the father tells his 30ish daughter, Toulah, “You look old! My friends and family kept trying to encourage me, saying I was still too young to be as old as I was looking. In an effort to staunch this flow of old, I climbed out of my gray hole, and into a platinum fantasy world. The journey is important to document.
I began life as a red ringlet headed baby which went well with my pasty white and ultimately freckled skin. By the time I was seven my Fiery Red Shirley Temple look had burnt itself out leaving very dark brown, straight hair (if you listen closely, you can hear my mother’s tears rolling down her cheek at this point).
While mama cried, I was pretty happy with the look since I could blend in with my seven-year-old crowd and hair washing wasn’t the trauma experience of the past. Then junior high and all its attendant hormones struck leaving me with a slightly auburn hued head and something much worse – The Waves.
These were not the once coveted, tightly controlled, tortured waves of olden days – that would have been bad enough. No, we are talking riotous self-willed waves where no single hair will lay down its personal desire to rule the world or join any other hair in the solidarity of an actual style.
In a failed effort to hide my nerd-ness, my mane spent most of its time imprisoned in the ponytail bun or under the fashionable statement of the triangle scarf. Do you remember those? A fabric triangle with strings on two corners. Correct application should leave one looking like a scullery maid. I had a stable full of triangle scarves in various colors and fabrics to coordinate with my just-as-nerdy home sewn wardrobe. I had to craft a lot of my own fashion statements… I was tall for my age, thin, and with no appropriately grown bumps anywhere. Hard to find school appropriate attire (remember we had rigid dress codes back in THOSE days) that fit me especially when shopping exclusively at the Navy PX.
Most of the inventory in the PX catered to the tinier size women of the world. I did not fall into either category – still a teen, and a taller than normal one for my age.
I was ahead of my time, “The age of tall women.” I was put on detention the first week of my eighth-grade year. Mom and I shopped for school clothes in August. I woke up two inches taller on the first day of school. The skirts that reached the floor while kneeling in August looked like I was trying out for the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader Squad. But this is about my coiffe…
To my relief, high school brought about change. My new world-wise girlfriends let me in on their hair taming secrets; I started collecting frozen orange juice cans. I removed both ends, wrangled my tresses around them and secured them to my skull with bobby pins. Then I went to bed. I still suffer permanent nerve damage to my neck.
During those painful days, I discovered the humble clothes iron made a great hair flattener. I achieved a sleek line to my slightly singed locks with only minor burns to my ears. Man, those were the days… or more accurately, those were the three hours of glamour, results of my labor lasting until the ocean breeze blew inland and returned me to my fuzzy world. The all-too brief, but oh-so sleek hours were well worth it.
Interestingly, in my mid-thirties, I got the insane idea that my hair would be easier to deal with if all I had to do was wash, shake, and go. It did not occur to me that that was how I was “doing” my hair already. But, now that I was in the working world, I needed more bang from those tedious four minutes I allotted to hair care every morning. Enter the perm phase.
Yes, that’s always a good idea. Enough relying on nature playing Russian roulette with my tresses. I can make a hair statement. Take naturally curly hair and submit it to harsh chemicals to produce crispy, shrunken crunchy hair. And I paid money for it. As I look back on this phase, well, I shudder. The only way you would know it was me and not Little Orphan Annie? I had eyes, eyes to witness the self-inflicted hair of horror. I did not make a return appointment to continue the Bozo meets Little Orphan Annie saga.
I discovered a little late in my life the delicate balance between too short and too long. I tried out every style and length as it surfaced – from the long cheer leader look to the ice skater wedge. Long hair took too much time – time to wash, dry, straighten, tame, pull back, pull up. Short hair took, yes, too much time. Washing was no problem, but the drying of short hair results in “styling.” There is always the piece over the ear that won’t lay down like the other side, and those bang things that were perfect yesterday seem to have completely forgotten their way. And ultimately, the nape hair provides physical evidence that your hair can and will stand up on the back of your neck. Overnight it has grown into a forest and needs to be mowed down to blend with the rest of the look. Consequently, I have invested in dozens of pairs of scissors. I have placed them in strategic spots around my house, so I am prepared to take back control when the renegade hair launches an attack of unruliness. I may not have won the war on hair, but I continue to wage the battle with my implements of doom.
Back to the subject of the ongoing hair color. In my later forties, (after spending hundreds of dollars and hours tin foiled and waiting for chemicals to give me that oh-so natural streaked golden blond and warm umber tones woven into my hair, I decide it is time to take that color wheel into my own hands and steer my own course to my crowning glory. Enter the home hair color kit. Clairol and I were to become close buddies. I was sure I could do this. So sure, in fact, that I began celebrating my new look before donning the plastic apron. Chianti and I were going to have a night to remember. By my second (I always underestimate the number, so read, third or fourth) glass I had all my working tools lined up and ready to roll. Apron on, instructions unfolded and, on the counter, fun shower cap with all the pinpoint holes to pull hair through, cool crochet like hook to do the pulling, magic bottles of coloring goop to mix in the glass bowls.
I encountered a few mission-serious difficulties at the very outset. First, I could read the directions fine, no vision deficiencies there, but when I looked up into the mirror to begin the arduous task of pulling the dark hairs through the tiny pin holes to create the desired golden blond and umber hued strands, I couldn’t see those tiny pin prick holes, or for that matter the end of the crochet like hook or fingers holding said hook. Easy fix! Put glasses on. Well, no that doesn’t work, now I can’t read the stupid instructions. Glasses on, glasses off, on, off, on, off. Ugh. Glasses and fun shower cap OFF. Pour a third (read, sixth) glass of Chianti, stir the goop, which is beginning to dry out, and just grab some hair with my plastic gloved hands and slather the stuff on, because how much color was really going to get on my hairs with the tiny little pulled through strands. I was going for a new bold look. Stopped counting the number of glasses, and now I have pretty much covered my head in the goop. Well, that was easier than I thought! I have saved money and probably launched a new trending hair technique. Put the little clear plastic bonnet on that allows those magic chemicals to cook up the look, and off to nap I go until the buzzer buzzes indicating the required cooking time is over.
Sometime during the night, long after the buzzer had been ignored/slept through/snoozed and shut off, I wake from my Chianti slumber. Something crinkles on my pillow and in my ear. Oh my freaking God. The panic rises in my throat as my 1:00 AM shower washes through my hair. I am reluctant, yet oddly excited to step out to the mirror. I mean really how bad can it be? Right?
Right. It’s hard to really tell what I have created while the hair is still wet, but I do see a hint of lighter locks. Well, that was the goal, to blend the gray into a much more appetizing golden hue. Back to bed, deal with it in the morning.
JC Penney’s, bless their corporate hearts, opens their salon at 7 am every weekday. By 7:01 AM I have reached the parking lot and am heading in to grab the first appointment. If I am lucky, I will have this crisis under control and be able to be at work only an hour or two late, displaying no sign of my previous night’s horrendous miscalculations. Cindy, a kind and sympathetic soul, greets me at the reception station, and valiantly tries to squash her laughter from erupting when I take the towel off my head. At this point in my hair growing/cutting/growing cycle, I have shoulder length locks. And I look like a deranged long haired calico cat. In my inebriated state, I had successfully applied the color over my entire head, but in unequal patches, not organized slender strands. Blotchy sections ranged in every shade between white and my almost obliterated dark brown. I confided in Cindy my story of DIY hair abuse gone terribly wrong.
We discussed various options that included shaving me to look like the gal in the STOP THE INSANITY diet ads, to the more widely accepted restrained trim, a nod to the two-inch pixie cut. None were sitting well with my upset stomach. We decided to not decide until she could evaluate the actual condition of the hair. Off to the wash bowl and a 10-minute conditioning session. Good news! The hair was not going to break off as she had silently feared, so we could take it all to the lightest shade on my head without me going instantly bald. Well, if we could do that, I wondered why we couldn’t just go ahead and return my head to something closer to my natural shade. Her eyes teared as she explained she was sure my hair would not withstand the torture of both pulling all the remaining colors to white then reintroducing a dark shade. The words purple and murky green slipped from her lips along with what sounded suspiciously like bald. That’s how I came to be a Marilyn look-alike.
Ultimately, Cindy did perform some wizardry – trimming off three inches to help quash the overall snowball in a snowstorm image. And I will forever be in Cindy’s debt for saving me from the insanity look and the purple and green options.
Never at a loss for words... 