Wild-Haired Women Wake Up With the Blues

In a world of silky-haired models with bone straight hair, I stand out from the crowd. Or I should say, my hair stands out—literally. An erratic halo of dark frizzy curls frames my face and tops my shoulders. While other women’s hair lies down and behaves and announces to the world that they are smooth and firmly in control of their lives, my hair likes to stand out and shout that I’m a bit of a mess--inside and out.

My hair tells the world that I lack discipline, and I’m lazy. It confesses that I refuse to get up early and gather my resources to deal with the natural disaster I’ll see in the mirror. Which force of nature will it be--a volcanic explosion of curls hurled straight up into the air or a tidal wave of frizz cresting in fury over my forehead? I could be a National Geographic cover girl. I look like a species that has yet to be discovered, except perhaps by Dr. Seuss.

I sometimes think the reason I wake up depleted is that all night as I sleep, my hair is siphoning energy out of my body. When the alarm goes off, my body is as limp and wrinkled as the sheets, but my curls are a fabulous example of potential AND kinetic energy, tightly wound springs that dodge and bob my feeble attempts to order them.

Other women use chemical weapons (mousse, gel, hairspray) and power tools (hair dryers, straightening irons, hot rollers) to create order and control in the morning. I’m a hapless leader who is ill-equipped for battle. I have a small bottle of John Frieda “Dream Curls” that I spritz hopelessly over my head in the morning. It’s like trying to end a mass uprising with a purse-size bottle of pepper spray.

What can I say? I’m weak. I have no pride. I just surrender to my inner wild child and let my unruly hair go its own way. I put down the brush and reach for the lip gloss. Screw my hair. I’m going to decorate my pie hole instead.

September 12, 2005

You Can't Fight Mother Nature

A few weeks ago, in a motivated moment, I decided I needed to exercise more and do some resistance training—so my muscles will burn more calories while I’m at rest or as I prefer to say, "getting in touch with my horizontal axis." Muscle mass, I’ve heard, is the key to beating middle-age weight gain.

Traveling the four sets of stairs spanning my house from basement to attic and my brisk walks to bus stops, Metro stations, and the parks near my home was not enough. I was getting only half the job done. You see, from the waist down I‘m Denise Austin (add a bit of cellulite, lose the tan), and from the waist up, I’m Olive Oyl. It was time for a change. My caboose was overtaking my train.

This is a conversation I’ve been having with myself all my adult life—because my long arms and bony shoulders have NEVER kept pace with my legs. As a distance runner in high school, my legs did all the work while my arms major task was to help my hands wipe sweat off my brow and push my hair out of my eyes. In my 20s, I joined a fitness class and never graduated past the five-pound hand weights. In my 30s, my back and shoulders bulked up a bit as I hauled babies, car seats, and toddlers, but as the kids grew up and I grew older, my upper body atrophied again and I started to look like E.T.

So in an effort improve my life, wear tank tops with confidence, and be able to haul even heavier groceries home from the bus stop (a GALLON of milk!), I embarked on a home exercise plan. I rolled my weights out from under the futon—everything from the puny 2 pounders I’m embarrassed to own to the 10 pounders I bought years ago in a rush of confidence (and never used). I warmed up a bit with yoga, stretched out, and then decided to do some pushups.

Not military pushups, mind you, GIRLY pushups, the ones designed for those whose weight and strength is centered in the rear, not the shoulders (C’est moi!). I carefully got down on my hands and knees, straightened my back, sucked in my stomach, snuck a peek down my shirt to see if I had great cleavage in this position (sadly, NOT), and then carefully bent my elbows to lower my chin to the floor. THUD! That’s the sound of my perfect form collapsing onto the rug, crushing my ego in the process. (OMG, is that a carpet burn on my chin! My humiliation is complete!)

I scrape myself off the floor, drag myself over to my computer and exercise my very strong mouse-pushing hand and double-clicking finger to see if there have been any studies on gravitational pull in Belgium . I’m convinced it’s stronger here, closer to the North Pole. This explains why my face is sagging, my rear end settles so snugly in the chair and my arms can’t do pushups anymore…..It would also explain the powerful, invisible forces pulling me into a horizontal position. We all know, you can’t fight Mother Nature—especially if you can’t do even one pushup.

September 10, 2005

PMS, Eve's Mistake, and the Second Coming

There's a big bowl of pistachio shells on my desk. I love pistachios. There’s something so satisfying about snapping them open and seeing a GREEN nut. And they’re salty, which makes them irresistible, especially at certain times of the month.

Of course, read any article on PMS and it will tell you to avoid salt, sugar, and caffeine in order to minimize symptoms like bloating, headaches and moodiness. In other words, just as every cell in your body is calling for the dark chocolate or the bag of Doritos (or both, God forbid), you’re supposed to deny yourself all that and expect to FEEL BETTER.

Oh yeah. Medical science fails women again. If you have a PMS Bitch and take away her morning coffee, afternoon chocolate, and one-night-stand with the Doritos bag, in the end you’re not going to have a NICE woman, you’re going to have a freakin’ psychopath.

Trust me: an ordinary bitchy woman is less of a threat to world peace, human health, and the people she loves if you just GIVE HER WHAT SHE WANTS. So I say, “Girlfriends, when your inner bitch rears her ugly head, break out a big bar of dark chocolate and don’t let anyone make you feel guilty about devouring it. Honey, you are SAVING civilization with every bite. You go girl! Everybody say ‘Amen!’”

Bibical history has it that menstruation was the curse Eve pulled down on womankind after she led Adam into sin. Sisters we ALL know that Adam went into sin all by his sorry little self, and Eve, establishing a pattern that would dog women for the rest of recorded history, covered for him.

“Oh yeah, God, it was ME, it was ALL MY FAULT he screwed up. Don’t be mad at Adam, he couldn’t help himself—I served him forbidden fruit! I’m such a jerk. He was just trying to be nice, joining me for a romantic little picnic out here in the garden!”

Uh-huh, uh-huh. I’m not buying that line for a minute! That story in Genesis is so lame—I mean c’mon, what kind of woman takes advice from a viper that LOOKS like a viper. None! We know better! But give us a viper in the shape of a man with six-pack abs, dark curly hair, deep blue eyes, and a sheepish smile, and DAMN, we’ll do ANYTHING for him—even disobey the Creator of the Universe. DUH! I'm convinced the children's bible pictures got it right: Eve was a blond.

Hang on a sec while I get some more pistachios and crack open another Coke. There now--all better--now where was I? Oh yeah, the first dumb blond who gave all subsequent blonds a bad name. Another curse on our heads (pun intended, y’all).

While medical scientists have never been able to figure out exactly WHY women menstruate, it’s been pretty easy for me to figure out why we have PMS. There’s been research done that shows women are perceived as more attractive when they’re fertile. When the egg drops, we all send out “a love me glow,” and through some metaphysical mystery, for a few days we attract men as easily as Jessica Simpson.

PMS, of course, follows this happy interlude and has the opposite effect. PMS shouts to the world—“Back away from this woman! Not suitable for breeding! We repeat, she is not suitable for breeding” PMS does this by adding five ugly pounds of water weight to our middles, making our pants grab us in all the wrong places, which in turn drives us to wear floppy gray sweatpants that are oh-so-flattering (NOT!). In case that doesn’t turn off the males of the species, our faces break out in angry red zits that make us look like we’re carrying an infectious plague. But if there are wonderful, rational men out there who still love us anyway, all we have to do is open our big moody mouths and snap their sweet little heads off. As heads roll across the floor, the message becomes perfectly clear: “Back off! Not suitable for breeding! Do not attempt to reproduce her DNA!”

The bad thing is that as I cruise through my 40s, PMS dominates my monthly calendar. This is because in mid-life, PMS not only stands for “pre-menstrual syndrome,” it also stands for “pre-menopause syndrome.” This is why I’m becoming a little BATTY (Bitchy All The Time Y’all). I’m caught in a riptide of fluctuating estrogen, and it’s making me crazy.

There is however, a cure for this, if only I could find it on a store shelf. What we need, Sisters, are Premarin M & Ms—pretty little pieces of dark chocolate laced with estrogen. Have you ever wondered if M & M really stands for Menstruation and Menopause? Are those bright little discs The Cure for The Curse? I have seen an awful lot of middle-aged women under their spell. They could be our salvation.

I’m convinced that when Jesus arrives in the Second Coming, he’s going to be passing out the estrogen M & Ms to all the women--even the blonds! And with divine M & Ms melting in our mouths, world peace will come again and men and women will all live happily ever after. Now that’s something to look forward to—that and some more pistachios.

September 2, 2005