Hair Trauma

Lately I've been dealing with some hair trauma. A year ago I had a nice wash-n-go crop cut. I loved it. The tips were even purple. Don't I look cute?


(National Mall, Aug 2006)

But that was a year ago. It's grown a bit since then. Here is what it looks like now:


(Glacier National Park, Aug 2007)

This has created some trauma. I had to start using a brush and a hair dryer. Which meant I had to go buy a brush and a hair dryer. So last week I found myself standing in an aisle at Sally Beauty Supply staring at shelves of hairdryer boxes covered numbers and adjectives and descriptions that all had two things in common: they ostensibly described superior qualities and they were completely meaningless to me. Does anyone out there know what Tourmaline is or why it makes for a better dryer? Of course not. That's because it is a semi-precious gem/mineral with electrical properties. I looked it up. Anyway, none of the boxes bothered explaining how a mineral with weird electrical properties "renews and enhances the vitality of your hair as it emits gentle infrared heat that seals in hair's natural moisture." Or the importance of ceramic or infrared or higher wattages or longer cords...oh wait. I can figure that last one out myself. Since the dryers varied in price from about $10 to $50 (give or take), I needed some rational way of finding the best value. So I grabbed the dryer that would fit into my bathroom decor best and asked the saleslady if it was a good dryer. She said yes. Since asking her was proving so much quicker than shopping myself, I asked her what brush to buy. She picked one out for me and I checked out with my Tourmaline-infused, ionic generating, 1600-Watt dryer and my Tourmaline-infused roller brush.

Once I had the dryer and the hairbrush I practiced using them. The brush is a round one with bristles, the better to curl those back hairs off my neck. But in order to curl the hair I have to twirl the brush in one hand while pointing the hairdryer with the other and I have to do all this behind my back without looking because I don't have a third hand to hold a mirror up so I can see the back of my head.

So I have a new hairstyle, but it still doesn't quite feel like me. I fretted about it to my officemate-in-Washington for weeks. Every few days was "Megan, do you think my hair looks okay?" Megan very patiently did not run screaming from the room the 15th time I did this. But I thought hair curled up at the back and sides on a woman in her mid-20s maybe looked a little too young. Although all this angst is coming from a woman in her mid-20s who had this hairstyle 15 months ago:


(Hike near University of Utah, June 2006)

So perhaps I shouldn't be taken too seriously. However, Megan was nice enough to explain to me that I was old enough to pull it off and not look like a teenager. That problem was solved. Only one issue left and that is that no one would believe my hair was this long. Not even my husband has seen it this long before. I know most women reading this won't think my hair is long, but for me this is epic. One woman at church stared at my head during the service trying to figure out if it was a wig (I have several, this isn't totally without a basis). And my officemate-in-Oklahoma, Naomi, was a little surprised to see me. But it seems that I am the only one with real issues believing I have hair measuring over two inches. Maybe I should get over it.