I just got my hair cut again, after a year and a half, and
was surprised at the change in procedure.
Since my hair has wave to it, I was used to the hairdresser wetting my
hair before putting me in the chair and applying the scissors.
However, this time she just draped me with the protective
cloth and started to work. The method of
controlling the wave now, to make trimming easier, is to use one of those hot
irons used by many women to straighten their unwanted waves and curls. My sister-in-law assured me that was now the
standard procedure, at least in this area, as this is what her hairdresser
does, too.
I started to think back to when I was a kid and the way we
women used to manage our hair.
Saturday was hair washing day. Back then, it was believed that it was not
good for your hair to be washed more than once a week, so there was no
hair-washing as part of the daily bath/shower routine. I remember most vividly the way my mother used
to curl my hair when I was about the age of five. She used to put it up in rags. Oh, not the same way it is done these
days. Her method was to take long strips
of old sheets and begin by layering them back and forth over her index finger. Then she would portion out a section of my
hair and comb it down around her rag-draped finger. After the curl of hair was made, then she
would wrap the remaining cloth neatly up over the curl she had just made, slip
it off her finger, and tie it up. She
continued doing this until I had about a dozen or more rag curls dangling from
my head. At least they didn’t slip when
she sent me outside in front of all my friends to play hop scotch, or whatever
the game for the day was.
Hours later, when the curl inside all that cloth had dried,
she would unwind all those rags and carefully slip them from inside the curl, and
roll each up for the next week. The curls
were set so well, I could pull them down and watch them spring right back up
again!
Part of this great curl success was due to the fact I had
naturally curly hair. And as such, the
teenage years were a grooming breeze for me since I did not have to tend to my
hair with any grooming.
Another fond memory I had was the night we were visiting my
aunt and uncle in Brockway, PA, and my teenaged cousin took me to her bedroom
and introduced me to putting one’s hair up in pincurls. Do any of you remember those days? That was when girls would take strands of
hair, wet them, usually with a comb or just their fingers dipped in a glass of
water, then wrap them tightly around a finger pressed against their skull,
slide the circle of hair off onto their head, and anchor it with crossed bobby
pins. Usually the whole head was covered
with these metal prongs. I remember my
older sister sitting on her bed, with the glass of water between her crossed
legs and her body, listening to her favorite radio program or broadcasted music,
going through this ritual almost every night. Very time consuming, but it did work! The results were nice waves, or curls
depending on your hair’s natural ability.
Then there were those little pink, plastic curlers with the
long, thin hinged strap that came over the division of hair rolled onto it and locked
into the opposite end of the curler itself.
They were part of that new invention—the home permanent. Remember? In our vanity, we would take strands of hair,
slip tissue-like papers over the ends to keep all the strands together, roll
them over those spikey things along the inside of the curler, set the anchoring
part of the curler, then dab the permanent solution all over those curlers
making sure they were well saturated.
Next came the plastic bonnet and then the waiting until everything
dried. Oh, I can still remember the
smell!
But they, too, worked and waves or curls resulted…at least
for a while, but lots longer than the nightly bobby pins!
Another method was curlers.
And they have had their own revolving, too. I have one of the first curlers I ever
used. It was a three piece metal contraption. There was a long tube of maybe five to six
inches, with a hinged half tube connected to it with a rivet near the top. We would squeeze a portion of the curler pieces
that protruded beyond the rivet and the pieces would separate. We would slip a section of hair between these
two pieces, pull it as near the end as we could without the hair slipping out,
roll the curler up, and then slip over a thin piece of metal wire attached to
the same rivet to “close” the curler.
They were hard to sleep on at night, but they also did the job. These evolved to plastic curlers. They started with the same idea as the
permanent curlers, but instead of the prickly inside, there was sponge covering
the curler part. Then it progressed to
just a single piece of rolled plastic, usually with holes in it to aid drying,
and the hair was once again anchored with oversized bobby pins. These curlers came in diameter sizes from
small to jumbo, depending on how curly you wanted your hair to be—or uncurly,
as the case may be. That’s where the
jumbo size came in. The last curlers I got (yes, the older I got, the less curl
I had) were heated curlers! They came upright
in a box you plugged into the wall. Their
charm? The heat curled your hair in MUCH
less time than the other processes I have mentioned.
Which reminds me, I almost forgot to mention the
old-fashioned “quick-set” using the heating iron. It was a long rod of ten to twelve(?) inches
that also had a hinged flap, a wooden handle, and an electric cord. It was plugged into the wall with the metal
tip usually resting on the provided metal stand. The portion of hair one desired to have curl
was sectioned off and slipped in between the two pieces of metal, wound up, and
held that way for a short time. The
trick was to get the desired curl without burning the hair!
Oh, what we ladies go through just to look pleasing for our
men!
As for me, so far the straightening that was done at the
beauty shop has not returned to either curl or wave. However, I do see signs of some curl
returning, I hope it won’t be too long before it is all back. I’m too old to learn new tricks, and I did
enjoy the looks of the wave I had. But
after all these years, it’s kinda nice to have it smooth, too. Oh, well, as long as I have what I refer to
as my “wash and dry” look, I am satisfied.
What is wash and dry? I wash it
in the shower, dry it with a towel, and comb it into place. What I see is what I get…and I am
satisfied. But what is more important,
so is my husband.
How about you? Do you remember those days? How do you groom your hair?
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