Over Scentsitive

I'm having a massive crisis of ego. See, I've been invited to a party tomorrow which I can't wait to attend, to celebrate the birth of a friend I love and whom I see much too infrequently. The thing is, it's a scent free party. No big deal right? Except that one was not to use any body products or laundry soaps containing scents for days ahead of time. And here is where I have my version of a fat Jewish femme freak out. Without hair products, I'm just a throwback to my former self as an awkward late 1970s teenager with hair I could not tame into styles that weren't meant for people like me. When everyone else was feathering their beautiful and shiny straight hair after VO5 hot oil treatments, I was standing in the bathroom crying as I stared at myself in the mirror.

There was nothing kind about these

I was the picture of imperfection: a chubby girl with bushy eyebrows, foundation a shade too dark applied all over my face and neck, black eyeliner softened in the flame of a Bic lighter smeared onto the rims of my eyes and powder-blue eye shadow unevenly coating my eyelids. But the real problem was my hair. The wisdom of black women had not yet been passed to white girls like me. There were no special curly-hair products to be found next to the Herbal Essence shampoo, and Farrah was all the rage.

What I lacked in straight hair, I made up for in blow dryers, hot rollers and curling irons. I routinely lit my hair on fire when it got sucked into the motor of the dryer. Once it was crisp and brittle, I would apply not one, but two sets of hot rollers and then when my curls were set, rip them out, along with chunks of my hair tangled on the sharp little points meant to hold the rollers in place.  After that I inevitably burned the side of my face with the curling iron. Every day. I'm convinced now that the person who invented bobble-heads was a teenage girl in the 70s.

It didn't improve all that much in the 80s when I came out as a lesbian in the time of Andrea Dworkin and mullets. It was a do-it-yourself era. Unfortunately, I applied this logic and sat with glee as my best friend, and unrequited crush, cut my hair and buzzed my head.

Honestly, I would have done anything to feel her hands on me and if it meant a horribly coiffed head, that was a small price to pay (not to mention that she did it for free). There was even an unfortunate time when I grew a tail, and then had it cut off, saved, and glued onto the side of my head for a whole new look. My mom liked the tail, she thought it made me look more feminine.

~

By the time I moved to San Francisco a month after the big earthquake, my hair was neither short nor long. It was, however, a huge brown frizzy wedge.

Shortly after I moved, I discovered and claimed my femme identity, so I just let my hair grow, and grow, and grow. It was easy, feminine and the closest I could get to the rock-and-roll glamor I admired. That was fine until I had kids and then I almost always wore it in a messy knot held together with a large plastic alligator clip (which looked not unlike a clip one might use to close a bag of chips).

One of my better long hair days

It wasn't until after my daughter was born a few years ago that I finally got a good stylist, the right hair products and learned to own my curls. Now my hair is ice blond, sassy, and takes no time. I wash it twice a week, apply two kinds of hair products when it's wet and then add more every day after my shower. The more days that pass, the better it looks. The key, besides a great cut, are the products. They are probably all petroleum based. I have no idea really. One is a clear gel, the other looks like Noxema. All I know is that without them, my hair looks like the dust bunnies you pull off the broom when you are done sweeping.

So, back to the party. I put a lot of hair stuff on today so that when I wake up tomorrow I can get away with only using water to set my curls. But I'm worried today's scent will linger. I don't want to make anyone sick because of my beauty routine, but I also do not want to forgo my self-confidence in order to be scent free. There may be a time in the dy istopic future when I have no access to shampoo or hair gel and I will have to settle for what I get. I imagine if that awful day comes, my hair will be the least of my concerns.

In the meantime, my good hair  is one of the reasons I can walk with confidence in the world. Take away my hair products and you take away my sense of wholeness. Which leads me to believe I may not have my priorities straight.

I wrote to the party hosts today to check in on this issue. They promise me they will have someone sniff me out at the door. I only hope my hair is up to the challenge.