May30

tangles.

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(not my sister but you get the idea)

—

my sister, p.

recently shared the following story

about her hair misadventure

and as sympathetic as i was

i could not stop laughing. 

and could totally identify. 

must have been nervous laughter

and gratitude that it wasn’t me. 

—

p. had gone to have her hair cut and styled

the very adept stylist easily cut it and blew it dry

with just a round brush

and

it emerged

into a full and lovely natural style. 

the next day

my sister decided that she could certainly do the same

so she armed herself with a blow dryer and big round brush

and had at it. 

only –

the brush got stuck

very stuck

absolutely stuck

tangled in both directions

and it was immovable. 

it was so bad

that she thought her only option

would be to cut it out

so she called the salon

explained the situation 

 they told her to come in for help

she drove through her small town

with the big round brush

still stuck on the side of her head 

parked her car

walked down the sidewalk

past the local businesses and people on the street

with it still stuck on the side of her head

and into the salon once more.

not surprisingly

they guessed her identity the moment she walked in

the salon was very busy

but not so busy that the staff and their customers

did not have time to guffaw and laugh out loud

unable to restrain themselves

people tried not to make eye contact

they walked her through the salon to the very back

where the staff took turns working on it

in between clients

until it eventually

was worked off of her head

one hair at a time. 

i totally get this. 

—

“so many tangles in life are ultimately hopeless that we have no appropriate sword other than laughter.”

-gordon w. allport

—

image credit: google images

66 responses »

  3. Your post gave me a memory nudge. When I was a boy I had a set of wind up cars and other vehicles. One day I wound up a bus (I seem to remember) and pretended that it was a set of hair cutters. I tangled my sister’s hair so badly in the mechanism that she needed a severe hair cut to repair the damage and the wind up bus never worked ever again!

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  4. I so get this. Those bristly brushes are super dangerous. My 5-y-o granddaughter had a similar experience recently. Only her misadventure was with small bristly colourful balls. She entwined about 15 of them in her hair at the crown. They looked beautiful, but they were impossible to remove. We thought she’d have to wait for them to grow out, or cut them out. Parents took her to the hairdresser the next day, and the hairdresser spent about 2 hours and oodles of no-more-tangles getting them out. I was very impressed. Her mum said information on the pack said to not put them in hair, but they didn’t see that until after. Doesn’t seem a very appropriate toy for young children.

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  15. That used to happen to me as a kid with curlers. Those big black bristley ones. OUCH! (of course why I would ever set my hair is beyond me because my hair is naturally curly :/ )

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  18. I felt your sister’s “pain and anguish,” Beth.
    I have direct fans at work on my thin, sometimes stringy hair. At the end of every day, it will look like a “rat’s nest!” 🐀🐭
    I once, only once. . . foolishly asked a guy friend to get a knot out of my hair. It was a big mess. He took a pair of scissors and cut it out quick as a wink! Yikes 😀
    I learned to wear a headband and condition my hair every night for the hot months.

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  23. I laughed so hard I nearly peed my pants. It reminded me of the time many years ago when I talked my sister, Arlene (Lord rest her soul) who had very long hair, that I would give her a great hairstyle. I teased her whole head of that very long hair. I can’t even describe to you what it looked like and the knots it made. She was hysterical crying and I was hysterical laughing. My mother put laundry softener mixed with water and in a few hours, she was back to normal. We laughed about that day for years. Thanks for the memory. Great post. ☺☺

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  24. Oh what a disaster. Definitely not a hairdresser! Years ago my friend brought her five year old to me as she had got a lollipop stuck in her very frizzy hair. We couldn’t even see it. She came to me because I’ve more patience than her.
    Unfortunately we’d to use some scissors to remove it.

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  30. I read this smiling and recalling the beginnings with my natural hair, when I did all I could with good grace to my hair but it just would not cooperate. The good side is that those moments make for beautiful stories ;).

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