Saturday, February 5, 2011

Shirley Temple Wasn't a Slut

This morning, I had my hair cut for the first time in over a year. This was partly due to financial reasons--a good salon haircut will run me a whopping sixty dollars, and some months I'd rather keep my cell phone and my split ends, thank you very much.

Partially, though, this is because I am terrified of anyone touching my hair. Terrified.

When I was eighteen, my mother took me to get a haircut on my birthday, which was about three weeks before I left for college. I left looking something like a mulleted cocker spaniel. You know how the fur on their ears is curly, with straight stuff underneath that hangs below? Yeah...That's what I looked like.

Growing up, my mother didn't allow me to have curly hair. You read it right. Both my sister Scarlet and I have curly hair, but we weren't allowed to wear it curly; we were told to brush it out, or blow dry it, or anything but let the curls do what they wanted to do. I read somewhere once that this is common for parents who have children with curly hair. Mothers don't like to see their 14 year old daughters with big, bouncy, luscious curls because something about it is too sexual, too primal, too bed-heady. Despite the fact that my hair grew that way, and it was big and messy not because I was rolling under the covers, but because I was rolling around in the grass. Playing. Like a kid does.

So I brushed it. And it was huge. And frizzy. And not at all curly, because you don't brush curls. If you do, they aren't curls anymore. Because of my mother's odd reaction to my natural hair, I didn't learn how to love my hair until rather late in the game, and it took a few tries even in college to figure it out, and to find a stylist that I could trust not to turn me into a dog. Or give me a mom hair cut. (no offense, Moms. None of you actually have mom hair cuts, anyway. You know the kind I'm talking about.)

When I first moved to New Hampshire, I scheduled a hair appointment for when I would be back in the Seattle/Bellingham area, but that's not managed to happen since last Christmas.

My cut today was with a woman who claims she is a "curly hair specialist," so I have high hopes. She gave me a blowout, so I haven't seen it curly yet, but at the very least it's gotta look better than the brushed out look I was forced to rock in high school.

4 comments:

Chelsea said...

Ohhh, I haven't dared get me hair cut over here yet. I would request photographic evidence!

Joanne said...

Pictures please!

Ashley said...

oh, it's not that drastic of a cut! mostly just a trim. luckily, it looks good curly, too! :)

Lyla said...

Sorry Ashley!!!