Hair

It is the potential bane of a woman’s existence. Famed on stage and screen in “Hair” and “Hair Spray”. For centuries we have been hair obsessed. I don’t know if cave men really drug their women around by their unruly locks, but Egyptian men and women wore wigs, and Roman women displayed their status with gold dust sprinkled curls piled on top of their heads. By the 1700's in Europe “big hair” was in vogue. Marie Antoinette was known to have a towering headdress 48" tall, while in England women were braiding and weaving hair into bird cages atop their heads. Unfortunately they did not have Aqua Net and used wire and lard to achieve their goals. Bugs and rodents were attracted to these creations causing some unpleasant problems, not to mention what a live bird would do! Victorians saved the hair from their hairbrushes and braided it into intricate brooches and decorations.

Throughout history different cultures have adopted hair styles as a form of identification, social and spiritual status such as the Chinese ponytail or “queue” and the styles of the Native American tribes.

If you have enough hair, you can share it with those who don’t by donating to Locks of Love. Or, you can donate it to the Gulf clean up effort where it will be used in booms to soak up the oil.

Until I was 10 years old I had LONG hair. It was naturally curly. A mother’s dream. Remember ding dong curls? Been there!

Most of the summer I wore a ponytail to keep the hair off my neck and out of my way. It was quite a tail and quite an attraction for other people. They would comment on it, or mess with it. Even when I wore my hair down whoever was standing near me usually had to be running their hands through it. One of my grandpa’s fishin’ buddies, Skinny Baker, would tease me by saying he was going to cut my ponytail off with his pocket knife! I caught on to that pretty quickly thank goodness.

My first haircut was the summer of 1970, right after the 4th grade. The Pixie cut was big that summer and my sister got one. So, of course I thought I needed to get one too. I changed my mind about half way through but it was too late. I hated it. My school pictures from 5th and 6th grade prove just how awful the growing out process was. I did not cut may hair again until the 80's.

I was never happy with my hair. I wanted long sleek straight hair like Twiggy in the 60's, and I wanted the feathery wings that Farah had in the 70s. I couldn’t even achieve the airy volume my sister did in the 80's. I could do the tight curly style however. It was not a good look for me. And there are pictures to prove it. I don’t know what I was thinking. Looking back I realize there was nothing wrong with long and wavy. But, alas, no matter how hard I try, I cannot get back to that.

Over the years my hair has faded and I have decided to wear it short and wild. My kids commented recently after a family reunion that Allen women looked good with short hair! It works for me.