Back when I was a young pup, when my kids were…you know…actually kids— I had a ton of poofy hair. It was partly poofy from a perm I would get a couple times a year and partly because I had way more hair then than I have now.
Quite tragic really…but I digress. Now in those days as my perm calmed a bit, I could use a curling iron to tame the wild beast. I’d smooth it all down and curl it under. Then, I could use a vent brush to fluff it just a bit.
Oh it would still be poofy, but a little less Bride of Frankinstein. You know?
Back then, I was a writer of children’s books. Now, most of the time when you write books, the publisher sets up signings at different book stores and they arrange everything…you just show up. That being said, the publishers and bookstores actually loved it if you set up signings yourself too–showing initiative and all that. So, we tried to do that anytime we were near the local book stores.
One day, I made a very ambitious plan to visit a couple of bookstores and set up some signings. It would be easy. It would be fun, even. I got ready to go on my adventure–makeup, jewelry, the right clothes and of course–my hair. I had everything working just as planned. While I was doing my hair, I got a phone call, talked for a few minutes and ended the call quickly to stay on schedule.
The first place on my list was Seagull Book. I loved this store because they were often overlooked by publishers and didn’t have nearly as many authors signings as other bookstores did. Plus, they were always nice–really nice.
So, I strolled in like I thought I was really something and spoke to the girl at the front desk. I was happy and polite and cheerful and sweet and peppy and everything I was suppose to be to get someone to like me right off the bat.
So imagine my surprise when the girl behind the counter was kind of aloof…dare I say…cold, even. Almost…rude.
Not only did she act very unfriendly, but she said she didn’t think they had the calendar space to set up anyauthor signings at all.
‘WHAAAAAT?! Was she kidding?!
I told her that my partner and I had done dozens of signings at all the other bookstores and that we would love to come here–anytime. She could pick the date. By this time, I may have sounded a teeny tiny bit…ummm…frantic.
I wasn’t used to this response from people.
She looked at me all squinty eyed and said, “I’m sorry. I don’t think so.”
I stood there like a dope and just stared at her for a minute or two, not sure what to do. So, I left. That encounter totally knocked the wind out of my sails and I didn’t have the heart to go anywhere else, so I just went home.
Sitting on the couch with a big bowl of feeling-sorry-for-myself ice cream my kids started coming through the door from school.
Jillian came in first and said, “Ummmm mom, are you ok?”
I said, “Yeah. Just having a weird day.”
She said, “But mom…your hair.”
I said, “What’s wrong with my hair?”
“Go….look,” she said.
I ran in the bathroom and looked.
What happened next is hard to describe. There was screaming mixed with hysterical, shrieking laughter. I think at some point I was sitting on the bathroom floor trying to mumble, “Buuu-buuu-buu-bu-bu,” like Goldie Hawn in Overboard. But mostly it was laughter….gasping laughter.
I had apparently been more distracted by the phone call than I realized. In my zeal to keep to my schedule, I had only curled HALF of my hair!!! You have to imagine this. One half of my head was smooth, tight, page boy, curled under hair, waiting to be fluffed out. The other half was still maniacal, wiry curls poking straight out from my head in every direction.
Are you getting the picture?!!!
I looked exactly like I’d stolen the warden’s jewelry and escaped from the nut house. Ohhhhh myyyyyyy. The humiliation.
YEEEEAHHH.
We’ve laughed about this for decades, mostly when someone asks, “What was your most embarrassing moment?”
Oh, and Seagull Book? I didn’t go back there till my 7- year old was married and had two kids.
When I was a little kid, I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wanted to be the beauty parlor girl.
I wanted to do all the fancy ladies’ hair in buns and beehives and poofy curls for all the balls and parties they went to. I knew I’d be good at it because my mama used to let me sit on the back of this very couch and brush out her hair, all the time. Sometimes she would even let me take her curlers out after the Dippity-Do was dry. I couldn’t mess with it too much after the rollers came out or the curls would go flat, but it was so much fun anyway. Her hair always smelled so good.
One year for Christmas I got a real beauty parlor doll that I could practice on. In fact, before I was out of my pajamas that morning I already had that dolly’s hair in the sink for a good scrub. Everybody knows that’s the first thing that happens when you’re at a real beauty parlor.
Mama said, “Oh, you’re washing all her curls out so soon?”Â
But Daddy said, “Aww let her go. That’s what the doll’s for.”
I knew I was going to put the curls right back. And I did, a million times over.
I know I brushed that doll’s hair within an inch of it’s life and sprayed so much Aqua-Net that it ran in her eyes. My hands we sticky for days. I used up a bucket of Dippity-do. Of course, Mama’s rollers and her brush and comb worked better than the pretend ones–so naturally, I borrowed them too. If I used too much stuff on the doll’s hair, it gave me an excuse to dunk her in the sink and shampoo her all over again. I don’t really think mama thought that part of the deal through, but she was sure patient about it.
To my surprise, the doll started to smell just like…my mama.
I loved it.
I looked it up the other day and do you know—that doll with all it’s fancy-schmancy beauty parlor stuff–the chair, the curlers, the play hair dryer and everything cost a whopping $9.95?
Considering my mama got $25 dollars a month for groceries–that was a pretty pricey doll.
I wonder if she was counting on all the free hair cuts and styles she’d be getting from me someday, so then it would hopefully all be worth it.
