The Mother's Curse

Everyone knows about THE Mother's Curse. You know - "I hope you have children just like you . . ." Well I had a little problem when I was a child and so I've known for a long time that my time would be coming soon.

This is the face of a child who has been caught cutting their own hair:

Instead of getting mad, I just explained to Emmaline how sad I was, and then told her two stories of my own. She got the abbreviated version - but I shall preserve here on the internet, the full tales!

The first was when I was five. There really isn't too much to tell about it. I cut my own bangs and of course I did it right before school pictures. My mom fixed it by pulling down more hair and turning those into bangs in order to hide the chop job underneath! If you look closely you can see it here:

The worst was when I was ten though. TEN! I should have known better by then! That was 1989, a time of big hair, hair spray, gel, curling irons, the works - and I was a tween! I was trying to grow out some of my bangs so they weren't so heavy (probably still heavy from trying to fix them 5 years before!). They were in that awkward stage where they are too long to be bangs, but too short to pull back into ponytails. For some reason I was anti-barrette so that meant that I just dealt with and struggled with them.

Well one day, I wore my hair to school in a ponytail, and I was annoyed with them all day. They wouldn't stay back no matter how much I hair sprayed them and it was embarrassing! By the time I got home from school, I was completely frustrated. I went into the bathroom and in a moment of clarity I decided that the only way to get rid of the problem was to get rid of the hair! I knew it wouldn't be a big deal because it was *just a few* hairs afterall. So I took out my mom's hair cutting scissors - and cut that hair off right at the scalp.

Guess what? A few hairs at the top turns out to be a LOT more hairs at the bottom! I suddenly had this bald patch front and center of my head! Oh the panic! And seriously - how do you tell your mom? But I did have to tell her. So I went to find and her and said, "Look mom! Look what happened!" and showed her my head. She questioned me how it happened, and of course I played dumb and said that I didn't know. My mom concluded that what must have happened, is that I had so much hair spray in my hair, that when I went to use the curling iron, the heat just burned the hair off. Yeeeessss..... I was more than happy to agree to that assessment.

My mom got me an appointment at a local salon. (I wonder if it is still there? Anyone in Alaska remember Charlie's?). We went in and the gal took one look at my hair and informed my mom that it was NOT burnt off - it was cut off. Whoops. And that is how I got a comb-over for the rest of 5th grade. She had to part my hair quite far at the side and cut in some layers and such to hide the bald patch underneath. Overall, it hid it quite well - that is until my hair started to grow back. That was just the salt in the wound. At one point the hair was just long enough that it stuck straight up all bristly-like but not long enough to lay flat. As a result the little tufts stuck straight through my comb-over. Lovely.

As luck would have it, I have no pictures of me during this time. Not on purpose - just none were taken. A bummer for all those of you reading - not a bummer for me so much.

So yes - when I found Emmaline with her hair like this today . . .

. . . all I could do it hug her and tell her how sad I was and tell her to never do it again. Afterall, it could have been a lot worse!

Rating: 2 Sour Patch Kids