This is a post about the least important thing in our society today: hair.
Hair does have cultural significance. The Bible says that a woman's hair is her crown and glory. Coco Chanel said, "A woman who cuts her hair is about to change her life" There are countless magazine articles about women's hair
It's not just women's hair that is significant. Oh no. Remember poor Samson who lost all his masculine might when he lost his hair? And doesn't Hair Club for Men leverage that whole concept into a working business model? To say nothing about the cultural phenomena of the combover. And Donald Trump - No. I am not going there. Nope.
Below: Poor Samson. A bad hair day was really, really bad.
All of this is justification for me to complain about my hair.
I have a lot of hair. I have so much hair that when I go to the beauty salon I tell the stylist " You may want to leave yourself extra time." Then, about halfway through she says, " You really do have a lot of hair" as she sneaks a glance at her watch. I leave a generous tip to make up for the glare she's are getting from her next customer. It's also partly a bribe in the hopes that she won't run into the back room and pretend to be at lunch the next time she sees me coming.
Worse yet, I have two completely different types of hair on my head. In the back there's a pretty strong curl and in the front and on top its pin straight. So it is overall too curly to straighten and to straight to hold a defined curl.
I feel that this is some kind of genetic revenge on the part of my black ancestor and her husband, because they had to leave their home on the Eastern Shore and move to Baltimore so the wife could "pass" for white in around 1860. I don't blame them for wanting revenge, really. If you think Baltimore is bad now, just imagine how it was with the Poles from East Baltimore fighting the Irish from South Baltimore fighting the Italians from Little Italy. All this with warf rats the size of small dogs running around and horse manure in the streets. To add to the fun, The Baltimore Riot of 1861 broke out and then, the next week, the Civil War started. At which point nobody was thinking about anybody's hair.
(Below, an image of the Baltimore Riot)
But, I digress.
My dream is that one day, I will be able to keep my hair up and out of my face. I use hair clips which are "guaranteed" to hold " the heaviest hair" but they actually hold the weight of about a third of my hair. I search Amazon looking for extra long bobby pins. I yearn for the day I discover a hairspray that keeps my hair in place but is not as toxic as the stuff coming out of the Wheelabrator Incinerator.
The Wheelabrator Incinerator Welcomes You to Baltimore!
Why don't I get it cut? Well, the front, the back, and the sides all grow at different rates. So I have the actual hairstyle for about 48 hours. I've had some spectacularly bad hair cuts. The one I got right before my senior prom stands out in my mind. I was walking down the street and, on two seperate occassions, I was stopped by kindly older who were total strangers to me. "Oh Hon!" they said, "Don't worry. It'll grow out"
The last time I got it cut it was so bad that I tied a scarf over it any time I left the house. Then my friend took my photo for an online dating site. The photo created confusion, because I don't practice any faith which requires me to cover my hair. And when it finally began to grow out, I was stopped in Walgreens by a well meaning (?) woman who advised me to color it because it looked like the hair belonging to - you guessed it! - Donald Trump.
By now you must be envisioning Rapunzel. Surely, with all this going on, my hair must be down to my butt. Nope. It's right about shoulder length. I know that there are plenty of women who manage to have Instagram ready hair this length....
But do you know what it would take for me to achieve hair like the style pictured above? About 9 hours, two different types of styling irons, 5 different types of products and a sacrifice to the gods. I'm supposed to be looking for a job.
Ah, but that's the power of hair, and it's significance in our culture. If I could only get my hair to look neat and orderly, I would do SO much better in job interviews. My skill with an uptwist would communicate my competence to handle everything from irate customers to creepy supervisors.
But alas, I head to the next job fair, with two super strength clips just barely securing my hair from falling in my face.
My life is destined to have all the glamor of a pony tail.
Any suggestions for me? Please comment below.