~Detangling~

I got a haircut yesterday. My hair had grown past my shoulders and since it's super baby fine, thin, and plagued by random waves that have no rhythm or flow to them, it was time to go a little shorter despite my husbands protests. It amazes me that a lot of men say they like long hair, even if that long hair looks like crap.

As an adult, I ran into a woman (on a good hair day) who'd lived next door to me when I was a little girl. She marveled at how smooth and shiny my hair was (as a child, my hair was a disaster) and then went on to remind me of the times she sat me down on our front stoop in Landover Hills and picked everything out of my hair from bubble gum and candy, to peanut butter and jelly, all while I protested loudly. I mean, what's a little food in the hair when there's roller skating to be done in the abandoned parking lot across from our duplex?

This little problem continued on after we moved from that neighborhood, and as I grew, so did the snarls. I would get a knot in the back near the neckline, and in order to avoid the pain of detangling, would smooth the top layer of my hair over it- every day. Before long, the snarl inevitably grew into a huge, matted clump that, despite my best efforts at concealing, made me look as if I had some strange tumor growing back there. Enter the detangler! My dad would sit me down in the family room with this frightening comb-like contraption that plugged into the wall and "gently" (according to the packaging) ripped worked the tangles from your hair. This was usually about a 30-45 minute procedure filled with tears from me, and yelling from my dad about how if I hadn't waited until it got so bad it wouldn't hurt so much, and he was right.

Ultimately, when the comb was unplugged and a mass of knotted snarls lay on the floor next to my dad, my hair was once again, smooth, silky, and tangle-free.

Wouldn't it just be easier if we worked out our knots in life before they grew to epic proportions, instead of waiting until they required dragging others in, and a long and painful production to get them straightened out?

One of the things I've added to my self-improvement list this year is to follow the advice of Barney Fife and be an active 'bud-nipper." If you're too young to know who or what I'm talking about, click here.

Sometimes I'm amazed at how long it took me to figure out that problems don't go away when you ignore them, quite the contrary.
Ah well - better to bloom late than never to bloom at all.


NIP IT!