Hair

"The hair is the richest ornament of women."
~Martin Luther

"I'm not offended by all the dumb-blonde jokes because I know that I'm not dumb. I also know I'm not blonde." ~Dolly Parton


Among womankind, there are certain topics of conversation that can almost always be counted on, given the situation. A group of married women can almost always sustain a rousing conversation about the idiosyncracies of their husbands. With groups of mothers, you can count on conversations regarding labor and delivery and childhood issues (orthodontia, childhood illnesses, discipline strategies).

Subjects that will take hold, however, with any group of women--of various ages--are accessories (shoes, purses, jewelry) and--best bet ever--hair. A case in point: Last week at Ladies' Bible Study, one woman walked into the room and complimented another's hair. The complimentee looked a little puzzled, and the complimenter said, "The color--it looks pretty. Don't worry, we all do it." And yes--J, sitting next to the complimentee, confessed that she had just paid her regular visit to the hairdresser earlier in the week, and I happily announced that I would be seeing my person the next day.

And nothing will draw a crowd of women around another like a new hairstyle with ensuing conversations about how one woman makes her hair do this particular thing, how we'd all love to have that hairstyle if only we were younger . . . our hair wasn't so thin . . . our hair wasn't so thick . . .

And so I began a personal reflection on the history of my own hairstyles. It's kind of boring. As I told a friend yesterday, there's a good reason I've never had long hair. My hair is so thick that it bushes out as it grows longer, and my face gets lost in this mass of hair that just plain takes over. And then it falls flat under the weight of itself. So the following is a pictorial history of my hair, starting at about age 2.



You can see here that the side part has pretty much always been with me, and, one way or another, I've kept the blonde. From my earliest years, I was being sent to bed in rollers or with bobby pins forming "spit curls" on the sides. This must have been during the years when I was still cooperative and didn't rip them out of my hair when the lights went out.



And here we see, visually demonstrated, why I am not a long-hair girl. This was probably about fourth grade, and this is the longest my hair has ever been. The only thing larger than the hair was the glasses, but that's a whole other fashion history. Note the bobby pin. And a conversation for another time, but I am wearing one of my first-ever pantsuits. (We weren't allowed to wear pants to school until third or fourth grade.)



Illustrated here is my college graduation picture, and note that by now the hairstyle has stabilized and has pretty much remained a variation of this form since my early high school years. Sometimes the part has changed sides (there was a brief regrettable period when I attempted a middle part), the back has gone up and down, the ears have been cut out at times, and there was a period of shame in Katie's early years when I actually had a perm, but by and large, this has been it.



"It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window."
~Raymond Chandler