My Family is Hairy

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bad haircut, Donald Trump, Donald Trump's hair, family, genetics, hair, hair loss, haircut, humor

I just finished giving our 19-year-old son a haircut, and I’m struck again by how much hair this kid has.

For those of you wondering, no, I’m not a professional stylist. I don’t even play one on TV, although I’d probably get paid more if I did.

We just look for ways to stay in-budget wherever we can. That’s why I’ve been cutting both my husband’s and our son’s hair for years.

Swipe #1

Our son starts his sophomore year of college next week, and wanted a haircut to get rid of this summer’s growth. It’s more along the lines of trimming a hedge, or mowing a field, because his hair is so thick the clippers sometimes makes this snarly gagging sound when it hits a heavy patch.

So far, the at-home chop jobs have gone fairly well. *Cough* There was that time my husband tossed his head back, laughing at something I said. The clippers ran a bit amok, leaving him with a little wonky *cough* indentation at his hairline.

Or the time I ever so slightly nicked my son’s ear, a fact he insists on bringing up every time I get the clipper box out.

Or the time I misjudged the snap-on comb length, and he ended up with what I generously called his Modified Buzz Cut. it was summer, so it worked. Mostly.

I think I see a tail…

But still, every time I give our son a haircut, there’s so much hair laying around that it looks like a small footless mammal slunk into the house and died on the floor.

He gets this from my side of the family. There aren’t any comb-overs at our holiday gatherings. No shiny spots. No widow’s peaks. We’re a hairy bunch.

I can basically count on the fact that anyone who has the telltale dark-hair-dark-eyes combo from my grandpa’s side of the family also has hair that grows like a Chia pet’s.

This was brought home the last time I got a haircut. For obvious reasons, I don’t take the clippers to my own head. I save that for less fortunate family members. I go to the salon once a month for a trim, but my stylist is trying to convince me to come in more often.

She ran her hand through my hair and got it stuck somewhere along the top. “Jeez,” she said. “You have a lot of hair. Are you sure we shouldn’t thin it out?”

I wear my hair like a Girl Scout merit badge. It took me years to get it like this, and I shudder at suggestions that it be less than its full glory. I have friends who complain about hair loss, who are afraid that someday soon, they’ll be embracing The Donald or some such version of an awkward combover.

In the meantime, the home chop jobs will continue. And I’ll remain thankful that in a world of Rogaine, bad comb-overs, and thinning hair, I come from a hairy family.

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Denial Is Just a River in Egypt…

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bathroom, cleaning, dental hygiene, family, humor, hygiene, men, motherhood, shaving

As with many things, it happened without my knowing it. And I could ignore the whole thing until I got my hand stuck in it.

This morning I went into the bathroom to take a shower. Like I’ve done hundreds of times before, I opened the cupboard below the sink to get a towel.

That’s when I noticed it. This line of goobery material that looked like that adhesive snot used, say, to stick a mailing label on a box. The kind that pulls up in rubbery strings and snaps back on your fingers.

But what was it doing in front of my towels? And how’d it get there? I scraped some away. Along with it came a few dust bunnies. Scrape, scrape. After a minute or so of this, I realized I had reached an impasse:

I could grab a towel and close the door, pretending I hadn’t seen the mystery material. (Sounds really good to me…)

Or I could get the scrub bucket and tackle this the right way.

Just then, I heard my mother’s voice, faintly, from a galaxy far, far away:

“If you’re going to do a job, do it right.”

Sigh. I got the scrub bucket and went to town on the offending strip of mystery material.

At this point, my female readers will know exactly what happens next. It’s not enough to rid the bathroom of the rubbery stuff. As long as you have the scrub bucket out and the rag in your hand, you might as well tackle the rest of the cupboards. 

It’s that phrase “as long as I’m…” that gets me in trouble a lot.

I opened Drawer #1 and took a good, hard gander. Dust. Another mystery blob of white stuff in the corner. Inside was a warped pre-Civil War eyeliner sharpener that looked like it could shred anything in its path. That went in the garbage before it came after me.

Next came Drawer #2. Hidden behind my hair dryer was some weirdo gizmo attachment that I haven’t touched since I bought the dryer back in the early 90s.

Exhausted from my efforts thus far, I took a break and Googled the gizmo, learning that it’s a Concentrator Nozzle, designed to “concentrate the airflow directly onto the hair you’re working on, rather than blowing your strands all over the place.” Who knew? I tossed the nozzle in the garbage next to the killer eyeliner sharpener. Let ’em fight it out.

I moved to the more manly side of the bathroom, emptying all the stuff my husband has in his cupboard. Out came three containers of dental floss, wart remover with an expiration date sometime in 2013, and four razors.

My first thought was jeez, how many razors does one guy need? I mean, he’s only got one face, right??

But then my thoughts wandered to the shoe collection I have upstairs. And possibly a few sweaters. Wisely, I put the razors back on the shelf. And as far as his floss collection goes? I’m just glad he’s not my friend’s husband. I also replaced the dental mirror. Hey, if my man’s into dental hygiene, who am I to argue?

On and on it went. Drawers and cupboards were emptied, their contents sorted out, tossed, cleaned. Dust bunnies that gossiped in corners and congregated along drawer pulls were flattened and rinsed away by my rag, clumping at the bottom of the scrub bucket.

Finally, it was over.

I took a well-deserved shower and pondered my madness. Is it better to be in denial when it comes to the things that lurk in my house? Can a little dirt be good for us? How clean is too clean?

I decided I’m probably good until next spring when I’ll tackle the basement. Or until I see the next collection of mystery material…

Laundry Therapy

Tags

childhood, connection, family, laundry, outdoors, therapy, together, writing

There are some household chores I’d skip altogether if I could. Dusting…scrubbing the floors… I really don’t mind doing laundry, though.

Yes, laundry. There’s something about clean sheets snapping in the breeze, then sleeping on them that night, smelling the wind locked in their fibers. My friend Barbara and I call this “Laundry Therapy.” And to a certain degree, it is a form of therapy for me, I think, partly because it connects me to family members. Simplicity. Outdoors.

When I was a kid, I helped grandma with her laundry. She and grandpa had seven kids, which meant tons of laundry, but by the time I happened on the scene, only two kids remained at home.

Something like this, only grandma didn’t smile this much. Or wear heels…

Still, she lugged her basket down the basement steps and over to the wringer washer. It was a laborious process – clothes got laundered in one tub, then plopped, soaking wet, in the wringer washer. Grandma stuffed jeans through its rollers, wringing out the excess water. I wasn’t allowed to get my hands near the wringer – apparently, grandma tried that already, with painful results. We headed out to the clothesline and hung up grandpa’s striped railroad overalls, monster undies, sheets, jeans. My job was to hand clothespins to grandma, dug out from a tin coffee can.

After, we’d sometimes, walk over to the neighbor’s. Angeline set out cookies for me, (she pronounced it “cooo-kies” for reasons I never figured out) and she and grandma had a cup of coffee while the laundry dried.

It was much the same at home, minus the wringer washer. I’d help mom by handing clothespins up – jumbled in a plastic ice cream bucket – and watch as she methodically hung wash. She was more orderly than grandma, hanging things largest to smallest – first came dad’s jeans, then hers, then mine, on down the line.

I had tea with Barbara the other day, and one of the first things she asked was if I hung laundry out. “It’s a perfect Laundry Therapy day,” she said. We laughed, and admitted that sometimes on beautiful, sunny days, we’ll scour the house, looking for things that aren’t really, truly dirty, and wash them, simply for the joy of having something flapping on the line. It’s the small things that give each day a little sparkle. And it’s different for everyone – a dear friend is a gardener, and looks forward to spring, when she can get her hands dirty and start the process of helping things grow.

I think it’s something more, too. Rob Bell talks about the disconnect many of us feel in our lives, saying “it’s possible to go days without spending any significant time outside, and it’s still considered ‘living.'”

When was the last time you got outside and really, truly lived?

Today’s laundry day!