some notes on my hair over the years

i’ve had a lot of hairstyles in my 30 years. but these days, it’s longer than ever. i’m so happy about this that, yes, i’ve decided to devote a whole entry to it. and here’s how i’ve been wanting to start it off:

i love having hair long enough that i can pull it around to my nose and smell my shampoo. when you have short/shortish hair (which i had for years), you never know how your shampoo/conditioner smells in your hair! it’s true, oh come on, girls (and some guys), you know it’s true. and if you’re reading this and you have long hair, don’t even tell me you don’t get a secret thrill out of breathing in the scent of your wonderful-smelling hair.

i noticed this over the summer after i started using probably the best-smelling shampoo/conditioner ever (matrix’s sleek look line. and i promise i’m not getting paid to say that. hell, i wish i was! matrix, are you reading this?? i will be your new spokesperson!). maid of honor (moh)/bff nicolina was visiting from the west coast. we were outside walking around, maybe waiting to cross the street? and she was like, “omg, your hair smells soooo good.” and i was like “OMG RILLY?” and then i took a handful, pulled it around to my nose and was like, omg, it does. and omG it’s so long. like all the sudden it hit me. [i’ve since sent nicole her very own bottles and will randomly get txt msgs along the lines of “omg my so hair smells so good! omg ijs.” (hi nicole! omg ily ijs ttys!)

the whole thing’s got me thinking about all the hairstyles i’ve had, many of them, looking back on it now (20/20 hindsight, i always say), bad. the photo above, i will sheepishly admit, wasn’t taken all that long ago. it’s from my “bad weave” facebook album. yeah, i decided to get pinkish-purplish extensions. they quickly lost their color. and i quickly proceeded to fry them with my one-inch flat iron [yes, i have curly hair; i straighten it w/a 400 degree flat iron almost every day (luckily, i’ve got it down to a science and it doesn’t take too long)]. they became frazzled, puffy, awful things. holly has always been supportive of my hair adventures, but this was the only time she ever downright disapproved. before they even got terrible-looking, she was like, “honey, i feel like i don’t even know you anymore. i don’t like them.” i was like: woh. this is bad.

i took matters into my own hands and removed them on my own. bad decision. i won’t give you details, but i think i’ve got a bald spot somewhere on my head, tho i haven’t been brave enough to really look. whatever. they’re out now. i’m much happier. so is holly. and i shall say: never again.

i think i told you about the year my hair was so big (ha, i’m starting to chuckle as i write this) that it didn’t fit w/in the frame of my school photo (that was also The Year of the Knot So Big That Mom Had to Team Up With Grandma to Comb it Out; baaaaad year). it was second grade, i think, and  i decided to ignore what was written on the bottles in shower and i think i was using conditioner instead of shampoo (cause and effect re: huge, photo-frame-defying hair). (my mom was so nice and said, “i think we won’t buy copies of your school photo this year.” and i–clueless, as always–was like, “ok.”)

when i was three years old, i decided i wanted to cut my hair “like my brother’s.”  (i know: gay.) i have a distinct memory of standing in my room with child-size scissors, snipping at my bangs. my mom was calling for me, asking what i was doing. soon i was standing in front of her downstairs (in elastic waistband pants and velcro sneeks) as she asked me–probably trying not to laugh–what i’d done. i’d cut my hair just like my brother’s, i explained. (an art teacher, my mom’s always believed in us kids expressing our creativity, so it’s not like i got in trouble or anything. plus, what was she going to do about it after the fact? i also cut the sleeves off one of her sweaters around that time. i was one of those kids who “got into things.” more stories for another day.)

i’ve done it curly and i’ve done it straight. did the whole angled, short-in-the-back-longer-in-the-front thing in the mid-90s (another bad look). i tried, desperately, to tease and spray my bangs up like all the cool italian girls (i’d say 75 percent of the kids i grew up with were italian) did back in the late 80s, early 90s. (that also failed miserably, as my thick, eastern european hair was just to heavy to, er, stay up like that.) then in ’99 i decided to just go whole-hog and cut it all off [see below (i know. the photo’s crooked. i’ve basically never scanned anything in my life except two photos and that’s one of them); and yes! ani difranco w/me! (in the basement bar of dc’s 9:30 club) i interviewed her for our college newspaper back in the day. she was extremely nice and generally awesome.) which was fun, but boring (my hair, not the interview). plus growing it out was another disaster. (can you say, um, jew fro??? yeah, notsofun, growin’ out a ‘pixie cut’ when you have said thick, curly eastern european hair)

i must say, at the moment, i’m happy with my hair, and have absolutely no plans to cut it anytime soon. i also must give three snaps in a z formation to holly for standing by my side the past 7.5 yrs as i went thru at least 10 different styles and quite a few colors (including the whole kelly clarkson chunky stripe thing. so outdated and so expensive and such high maintenance (esp. the red; yes i had the red. oy.). thanks for loving me thru the thick (hair) and the thin. also really bad extensions. and probably a bald spot or two. but like i said, i’m not certain about that and i’m really not all that interested in checking.

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“yeah, but i’m still young”

does your life ever suspiciously resemble a movie? like, in its ridiculousness?

a lot of things–ok, a whole helluva lotta things–have been happening to me lately where i just have to shake my head b/c i honestly feel like i’m in a movie. [or a bad (gay) reality show.] until now, much of it has revolved around our wedding. now that that’s had time to settle down (i.e. it’s over but family fallout drama continues), other crap is seeping in. like this:

recently–what was it, saturday, early evening?–holly & i went to our local safeway supermarket. we finally make our way to the cashier. he’s this kid, i mean, maybe early 20s i figure? kind of trying to rock the half-mutasche/goatee (half b/c i guess he’s still going thru a delayed puberty or something; whatever, i’m not making fun, i’m just saying) thing. anyway, as he’s waiting for us to swipe our card and go thru the million tap-on-screen friggin safeway buttons to pay for the darn stuff, he simultaneously takes a firm hold of the top of his head in one hand and his chin in the other. oh, i know that grip, i think. the neck crack. have you done or seen that before? you pull your head one direction and your chin in the other. and if you’re “lucky,” your neck will let out a crack loud enough to wake the dead. yeah, totally used to do it all the time. my back also (which you accomplish thru this weird twist. i won’t go into it b/c i’m sure it’s bad for you). not hatin’ on it b/c i’ll be the first to admit that all that feels goooood.

holly said something first. something along the lines of “woah.” and then of course i have to chime in, seeing how i was suffering from a migraine–or just got thru one, i forget–and, thru many doctors and many tests, i’ve discovered that a lot of them begin in my neck. now i don’t know if there’s an absolute connection between all my middle school/high school/college/post-college neck-cracking and these terrible migraines i get, but if i could go back in time and erase all those hundreds (probably, yuck, thousands) of neck cracks even if it gave me the slightest chance of fewer headaches, i would.

anyway, i’m like, in all my 30 years of wisdom, “you know, i used to crack my neck like that all the time. now i go to the chiropractor sometimes two times a week b/c my neck’s screwed up so badly.”

and the little punk looks at me like i have two heads and is like, “yeah, but i’m still young.”

and i’m like: ohnoyoujustdidn’t. so i’m like, “how old are you anyway?”

i think at this point he’s scared. i was shooting fire out of my eyeballs at him, i’m sure. so i sure as hell would be, too.

he’s like, “i’m almost 21.”

and then i’m like, “so how old do you think i am anyway???”

he shrugs and he’s like, “26, 27 tops.”

and i’m like, “well, i’m 30 and i’m not that old.”

the whole thing reeked of bridget jones. (love both those movies but don’t wanna live ’em if you know what i mean)

what i really wanted to do was go on a rant about, “don’t you know ANYTHINGabout women?? and what am i, 95 or something??” but instead i shut up (something i’ve only very recently learned how to do) and just fumed and of course when we got outside i let loose w/my usual jersey “effin'” this and “effin'” that. holly knowingly chuckled (she’s a tad older than me).

i guess when we all get to a “certain age” we all rack up these kinda stories, the first of which is always the most painful, i’m sure. but i’m just like, what the hell, you know? half the time ppl ask me if i just graduated college [probably b/c somehow i’m always in denim (sometimes even rockin a jean jacket, too. i know i know fashion no-no but whatev) and most of the time, like, kitten heels or black pumas or something. the frosty lipstick/bangs/gum combo also prob. helps) but now this? i know i know, he’s just a kid from baltimore. he didn’t mean anything by it. but it was annoying. and i just thought i’d share.

the whole experience has me thinking about those “movie” moments. and it occurs to me that those moments are written into movies b/c they actually happen. so, if you all would care to share your most memorable “movie moments,” by all means, let loose. i’d so love to hear them.