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the latest
waddle: good morning, wordpress - 10:36 a.m. , 2009-07-03 elaborate murder attempt - 2:56 p.m. , 2009-07-01 building a tractor in the basement - 10:42 a.m. , 2009-06-19 ask no questions tell just a few lies - 3:17 p.m. , 2009-06-09 my long lasting flavor really lasts long - 1:10 p.m. , 2009-06-04
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COMPLICATED HAIR FEELINGS My hair is a total fucking disaster. I cheated on my haircut guy, with a woman (scandalous!), and I do not know the Hair Words so I just told her I needed a change. That I needed to look less dorky, and less I-don't-give-a-shit, and maybe have something approaching a "haircut," you know, like regular women who know how to buy shoes and wear makeup. She took that to mean that I actually was a regular woman, who would magically know what to do with a haircut that has about a million little bits sticking out everywhere. She put some sort of goop on my head and did a lot of fancy blow-drying so that the bits looked at least marginally planned, even though the whole effect was very Not Me. I do not seem to be able to do this, and the effect of me not doing it is horrifying. The effect of me TRYING to do it is equally horrifying, and kind of fruitless, because after various products and brushing all I end up with is a million slightly greasy little bits sticking out everywhere. The only day it has ever approached normal was the day that I smashed it all into a bike helmet and rode about six miles. Which is not a very practical styling solution for every day. Here is the other thing: I don't care. Obviously I DO care, otherwise I would not be giving it a second and a third and a fourth thought on the Internet, but there is a large and definite paper cup of Indifference Coleslaw next to my Social Conditioning Reinforced By Billion-Dollar Beauty Industry Combination Platter. This is not new. In my younger days I also did not care, but I did not care in an angry, conscious way. Fuck if I was going to be caught putting on eyeshadow or flipping through magazines for haircuts I might like to try---do I look like some kind of stupid fluffy girl? When I set up the narrative this way, the usual turnaround is that the little punk girl grows up to be a woman who concedes that looking pretty is kind of fun and that nail polish is not the tool of The Man. But while I don't judge any chick who goes in for the whole routine, I guess I just can't be bothered to do it for myself. Is this maturity? This huge EHHHH about any sort of beauty standard, even the bare-minimum, one-step-above-treehugger (leg/armpit shaving, pricey moisturizer, occasional lipstick) standards that I set for myself? And can I please learn some goddamn Hair Words so that I am not reduced to feebly hoping that the stylist can soak up all my many different Lifestyle Vibes (mom, editor, part-time beer-soaked hipster, part-time responsible grownup) and magically produce the perfect haircut? For fuck's sake, it is not her job to read my palm or produce my personality chart, she is just there to shampoo and snip. I don't know why I expect the haircut girl to have a level of insight into my secret soul that I do not require from my own husband. HER LOVELY LUMPS This weekend we went to a birthday party at a park, and the birthday boy�s mother had staked out the party area with huge bunches of balloons attached to those things. Nora was instantly intrigued, and after a lengthy discussion wherein I re-discovered just how odd it is that one can purchase foil-wrapped rocks specifically to hold balloons down, we got on with the party festivities. Nora drifted away from the action several times to "check on the balloon things" (her words), and after the balloons had been handed out and the weights freed she collected a few, lined them up in the grass, and fondled them lovingly. Then she sought me out and whispered, "Can I take these home?" I told her to check with the hostess, and when the green light was given she was ecstatic. You can keep your lovely favor bag, just give Nora the balloon weights! On the way home she opened one up, "to see what was inside," and although I warned that we could never get the shiny foil stuff back on (silly me, thinking that the prettiness of the balloon weight was part of its appeal!), she wanted the other ones unwrapped as well. If anything, Nora was happier to have three plain lumps of concrete than she was to have three shiny pretty balloon weights. She named them Lumpy, Connie, and Concretey and insisted on their presence near her bed at naptime. And then when I went in there to get her up the lumps of concrete were under her pillow. Okay. I am so delightfully baffled by this kid lately. Besides the lump-of-concrete love, she has also developed a semi-irritating habit of calling me a "human." Me: [expression of dismay in the kitchen as I spill something] In my house there is a three-year-old wearing only underpants, swim fins, and a backwards baseball hat, cradling a lump of concrete like it was the world's cutest baby doll, and talking about "humans" as if she were other than. Sometimes I wonder. ---mimi smartypants delivered Colonel Sanders down to Davy Jones' locker. |
