Hatless?

I left the house without a hat yesterday. People, not just women, can be obsessed with their hair. I can remember being obsessed with my hair. Whatever the style was when I was young, I could never seem to get it right, at least, not as right as all those so-much-cuter-than-me girls. I can remember when I went out on dates, and that requires a very long memory, maybe about 48 years ago; if the date (Joe) left the car for a minute (I don’t know, to get hamburgers or something), I would quickly check the rear view mirror and put any stray hairs back in place. The rear view mirror? Yep. Back in those days, the two front seats were not separated by a console; and seatbelts weren’t around, so the passenger might possibly be sitting in the middle of the front seat, you know, closer to the driver. To check your hair or make-up or whatever, you would use the rear view mirror (there were no mirrors underneath the visors). Yikes, what a history lesson here. Well, surely if you weren’t a teenager some 40 years ago, you’ve at least seen a movie ala Grease http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJcHTblkljM or American Graffiti http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h32Kdrh0Z48, or Dirty Dancing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VSuCtebBT0 or reruns of Happy Days www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLt7clQbBzo. If not, you have no idea what you’re missing. Even way back then, I worried about my hair. I’ve permed my hair, colored my hair, and tried many different styles. Before I lost my hair to chemo, it was quite stylish for a person in my age bracket. I had three different colors: a base color and blonde and red highlights. I always kept some sort-of bangs to help cover my high forehead, but the rest of the hair on top was spiky and so was the back. I had my hair done every 6-8 weeks. Since last July, I may have saved money on shampoo, conditioner, color, mousse, gel, and styling. However, that was all offset by wigs, wig shampoo, wig conditioner, wig molding putty, scarves (never worn), and a vast array of hats. I have a hat to match pretty much any color outfit. I have a silver baseball cap, a gold baseball cap. Actually, most of my hats have some type of glitter or shiny something on them. I figured if I had to wear hats, they might as well make a statement. I could never get the scarf thing down. I didn’t really try very hard. Since I can’t put together something that comes out of a cereal box, I didn’t think swirls and ties and knots would work for me. Am I ready to go hatless? Yesterday, I only went to Wal-Mart. That was easy. Last week after the bachelorette festivities, sitting at home with no hat on, Teresa and Susan both said I don’t need to wear hats anymore. I asked if they had agreed to gang up on me, and they denied it. They told me to just go without the hat and cop an attitude, along the lines of I have short hair, and I can get away with it! O.K., Laura’s probably putting me over. On Friday, she gave me a gift bag with the smallest hairclips ever invented and a jar of Bed Head Manipulator. That’s pretty amazing, since that blue stuff is exactly what I used on my previously spiky hair. She couldn’t have known that. She also gave me a card that said, “Go for it!” So, my damn hair is white, short, longer and thicker in the back, and not enough on the top. I am sick of hats already, and they’re starting to get hot. I experimented yesterday, and I’ll play around with it some more today. Tomorrow morning I’ll decide if I can ditch the hats, cop an attitude, and go to school.

A Teresa Day…

I took a day off from work; Teresa did, too. She arrived at 9:00 a.m. First things first…Starbucks. Then we went to my place just for a little bit. I wanted her to hear the children’s book I’ve written about J.J., me, and cancer. It’s meant to be a picture book, but I have no artistic talent to provide the illustrations. Teresa said she knows an illustrator whom we could look up online. I also wanted to give her a copy of Gingerbread Gems of Willimantic, Connecticut. My friend, Steve, sent me a copy. Willimantic is the one-horse town that I was born in. Since 1968 when I moved to Las Vegas, I’ve only been back there three times, with the last time being in 1984. I really have never had any desire to remember much of anything about Willimantic or to revisit my life there. Steve has revived old memories of that town, while contacting me about an upcoming class reunion. It seems that Willimantic is becoming quite the little destination, if you have any interest in things Victorian. The book has a lot to do with architecture and, therefore, the reason for giving Teresa a copy because of the connection to civil engineering. I also had a copy of an article about the huge overpass that is being built over Hoover Dam. I don’t really know if Teresa appreciates these things or not, but I usually try to save for her anything about bridges, special buildings, etc. Teresa had a great idea to go to the Venetian and take a ride on a gondola. We did, and it was fun. We took the inside ride through the shopping concourses. I’d like to go back again and take the outside ride. I commented to Teresa that now I understood why people had to audition for this job…they sing as they row the gondola. Teresa pointed out to me that she saw motors underneath that were actually propelling the gondolas. We did give credit to the gondolier for steering, however. The gondolier told us there was a strolling entertainment show coming up shortly in the courtyard. We decided to go eat at Wolfgang’s with a table right at the edge to see the entertainers. We each commented that at first we had actually thought the one guy was a real statue. As it turns out, he just pretends to be one. We wondered if he gets all the money that people leave on the steps for him. There was a guy on stilts, and that reminded me of a teacher at Harmon who does things like juggle while riding a unicycle, and from what I’ve heard, also does stilts, hopefully, at our upcoming carnival. While at the Venetian, Teresa checked her BlackBerry for movies. I recommended “21” and it was playing shortly at Green Valley Ranch so that’s where we headed. “21” is based on the true story of some MIT students who years ago came and took the strip by storm and a pile of money with a card cheating ring. At least for Las Vegans, I think the movie is great. After the movie, we came home and mostly just chatted. We did look up the illustrator she knows, and I’m still thinking about it. Krista came by to pick Teresa up for dinner, and I insisted she come in and give us her Introduction to Krista speech that she gave at Toastmasters a couple of weeks ago. Since Teresa used to be in Toastmasters, she knew exactly how to introduce her. We heard about the three roles Krista plays in life: sister, team player (at work), and friend (to Zoe, her Yorkshire Terrier). The ladies left to go to dinner, and I left to go to my 7:00 class. O.K., there was some Krista in there; but, mostly, it was A Teresa Day.