A Life in Tresses (Part III)

Personal Memoir

My post perm, professional haircut (1985)

A Life in Tresses (Part I)

A Life in Tresses (Part II)

I permed my hair once with disastrous results. I turned fifteen in the summer of 1983 and was obsessed with corkscrew curls. They were all the rage—plastered across fashion magazine spreads and sported by models and actors alike, such as a teenaged Sarah Jessica Parker during the Square Pegs years. I coveted my friend Shira’s thick mass of springy curls despite her lament over a demanding hair-care regimen.

My fine straight hair was dense, making it slow to dry and hard to curl. I had a love/hate relationship with my curling iron. On Sundays before church, I spent an eternity in front of the mirror styling my hair, only to have the curls droop by mid-morning, even with a thick coating of hairspray. The most successful curling attempts came by either rolling my hair at night in socks or braiding it while wet. The results produced soft waves but never the tight curls I desired.

In the spring before my fifteenth birthday, I began my first job as a Worcester Public Library page. I labored a total of twelve and a half hours a week after school—two and a half hours per day—typing book pockets and filing cards into the card catalog. Underage students worked under a special permit and were paid less than minimum wage, but for the first time, I had my own money to spend. Many days I wandered the library during my fifteen minute break if I wasn’t chugging Coca-Cola and eating pre-packaged Cheese Danish pastries from the vending machines in the break room. The periodical section was filled with magazines covered with those tantalizing curls. By summer, my savings account had grown, and the money burned a hole in my pocket.

My grandparents lived in a small Indiana town called Centerville, near the Ohio border. Every summer we made the trek to visit them—my mother using two weeks of her annual vacation days. The journey took about twelve to fourteen hours to drive the distance, depending on road conditions and the endless construction on interstate highways. Along the way, we stopped at tourist attractions and historical sites to break up the monotony and to give my mother a break from driving.

My grandmother belonged to the generation of women who booked a regular appointment with the hairdresser to wash, dry, and style their hair. That summer I revealed my desire for a perm. There was no reason for my mother to object since I had saved my own money. Grandma McGraw suggested I set up an appointment with her shop and I agreed. A perm in rural Indiana cost much less than one back home in Worcester. I thought I had scored a deal. While I did save money, I lost refinement and sophistication.

I walked the few blocks to the hairdresser’s establishment on the day of the appointment. Her shop occupied a small, single-story wooden building—an old converted garage or carriage shop—which was nestled behind the more formal brick buildings on Main Street. One or two styling chairs occupied the main room. A row of beehive hair dryers covered the opposite wall.

“How big you’ve grown!” the hairdresser said in her Hoosier twang. A big smile lit up her face as she continued to greet me with all the obligatory exclamations. “Your grandmother is such a wonderful lady.” In a small town, everyone knows everyone else and their business.

I showed the hairdresser some magazine clip-pings of the curls I wanted. She nodded her head and began to work on my hair. The process took hours between the washing and cutting, wrapping, and waiting for the results. When I emerged from the beehive dryer and returned to the styling chair to view the final outcome, I was crushed. My hair had accepted some soft waves, but was nowhere near the tight corkscrews I craved. All I needed was some blue tint to complete the old lady hairdo. I watched my hard earned cash circle round the bowl as I flushed it down the drain.

By the time I returned to my grandparents’ house, my eyes brimmed with tears. I grunted hello as I passed through the dining room and headed to the shower. I tried to wash everything out even though I was not supposed to wash my hair for at least twenty-four hours. Of course, that didn’t work. Back in Worcester, as the ends lengthened, I wielded my scissors to eliminate rows of unruly waves. At one point, my hair mirrored my mother’s horrid cut until I paid a true professional to feather my hair into a stylish bob. That terrible perm shaped the trajectory of my hair through high school. As I left my adolescence behind, my hair reflected the more confident individual who was beginning to emerge.

To be continued…