Sunday, December 20, 2009

hair cutting gone wrong...again

so last year at christmas i went home with ratty hair. i also had a pretty rockin' acne breakout, so you could have easily mistaken my 2008 christmas pictures with the fam, from ones when i was sixteen.

so i made two promises to myself. one, i was going to clear up my acne. that was my new years resolution. i think it was the only resolution i have ever followed. my friend mai-stella's friend, dan kerns, started some acne company-- acne.org where he has the three step REGIMEN. so i started it and followed it religiously. i love dan kerns. you can watch his cute little videos about how to wash your face and stuff. anyway, it worked! my skin was looking like a non-adolecent until this fall time, where i took a little backtrack because of some stupid i.u.d. (hi mom!) my second promise was to get my hair cut before i go home, so i don't look like a ragamuffin. which (hair) is the topic of this post, not my acne.

so i go to the hair dresser and say: "i want my hair length between my SHOULDERS and my CHIN, so i can put it in a PONYTAIL. and, yeah, you can make it look cute with some layers if you like." i am not too picky. i feel like we had an understanding. she pointed to the length of my hair. then, you know how it goes. she asks me when the last time i got my hair cut was, and i say: in july i cut it myself. (i left off the part about how i just chopped my pigtails off, so it was all crooked...) and instead said: "i cut my hair about twice a year."

so maybe she took that small talk as liberty to cut a little more than our initial agreement. she started in the back and i could tell something was going terribly wrong. but i felt funny interrupting her so i just sat silently knowing it was going to be bad.

and it was.

i mean, it didn't look that bad. kind of bowl cuttish. ya know, CHEEK BONE length. i was definitely going to rocking the bike helmet mullet, i could tell. and i knew i'd look dumb for the xmas pictures again. i guess the only good thing that i can say about it, is that it was going to require the use of hair gel. and there was a period of my life, while i was residing in the eastern bloc, that i got a little bit into hair gel. like re-apply a few times a day, into hair gel. like, crunchy hair, into hair gel. and i could dig that again.

but, the hair cut is totally impractical. no ponytail. i can't even two little ponytails. so come monday, i am going to put my helmet on, bike to work, and be stuck with sweaty, matted down, weirdly cut helmet hair at work all day. with things flying up all over. and i won't even be able to put it in a ponytail to hide my sweaty yucky hair. and i don't really know how going to the gym is going to work, cause i can't put it back, and the hair just flops around in my eyeballs and is going to be a pain in the ass jumping rope. i think i am going to need to get a sweat band or something, but that won't help that flop in the back, so maybe a swim cap is a better idea.

despite all this, i was trying to be optimistic about the hair cut. until i woke up this morning. "this hairdo will be easy, you won't have to do anything to it" hair dresser lady says. bullshit. i should have rolled out of bed and went right back to the hair place in my pjs and ask her what does she mean by "not do anything."

so i did what any logical person would do.

i got scissors out of my bottom drawer and took matters into my hands.

i tried to "thin it out" by doing that flutter cut you see people do. i think i got the hang of it eventually, but cut some chunks in my hair a few times by accident. oh well. i thinned out a lot of hair. the trash can was pretty full. then my hand got tired, so i stopped. except i only cut the left side, so now i have two different haircuts on each side of my head.

it's super post-modern.

so, in conclusion, i decided i am just going to wear my helmet all the time. my boyfriend just got me a new helmet. except i am not wearing it-- except when he is around-- because i don't want to ruin the new one. so i am just going to wear my old helmet all the time. you never know what is going to happen in a cubicle. the building hasn't been seismic retrofitted yet, so i can just pull that card for the next few months until my hair gets to be ponytail length again.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

buzzcut!!!You know you want to :)

Gilby said...

You can't hide behind a bad haircut, Beth. We all know the purpose of this post was to let readers know that BETH HAS A BOYFRIEND. Which also explains the IUD.

Brian Peterson said...

Thanks Beth. I definitely needed to laugh a bit today and you made me do that.

Track Ninja said...

Sounds kind of punk to me. I stopped combing several years ago. A guy i worked with, 25 maybe, who looked 40is and was losing his hair came in to work and looked like he just rolled out of bed. At that point i decided it was okay to stop combing and worked great. Now if i ever actually comb my hair its like i'm dressing up. It's all about setting expectations low.

That said...punk rock hair is a statement. Should make a bit of it blue/pink.

Heavens to Betsy said...

is it time to go to marin? and also. next time i leave i'm taking the scissors with me - you obviously can't be trusted with them anymore ;) xoxo have a very merry holidays in o-hi-o with the b-f and family. (and amy and manuel and the pauls and thursday's etc.etc.etc.)

norcalcyclingnews.com said...

two words...

flow-be

Anonymous said...

to my darling goddaughter, hair only becomes an issue when people start referring to it's gray color as a "look of sophistication"