May You Always Face the Sun so Your Wig Never Molds in the Shadow
Notes to self:
1. Must stop talking to myself outside of my house with lips moving.
2. Must stop using the word "freakin'" as the all-purpose adjective/adverb. I am getting on my own nerves. This has gone too far.
3. Must live up to my own expectations, not others.
4. If I'm going to thumb my nose at the world and dye my hair gothic black with attitude, must not cry when people laugh. What a sissypants! I don't deserve badboy black hair!
5. Must get a really cool infection in my finger, and truly let it fester this time to see what happens. Ten fingers are SO over-rated. You can only pick your nose with one anyway.
6. Must stop trying to hard to fix the world ... fix myself ... then work on the world.
I've decided that when I need to tell a story that involves someone I know, I am going to rename this person the name of a celebrity of similar looks and personality so no one will get mad at me. Even my brother has gotten to the point of saying, "Heath, I'll tell you this but it is NOT to go into your novel." Sheesh ... as if I can't be trusted. I've snooped in dozens of diaries, emails, notebooks, underwear drawers, bathroom cabinets and anything else anywhere I can get my nosy little hands on ... but have I ever once revealed the awesome dark secrets I've uncovered? NO. Not once. I keep these juicy tidbits all to myself. That way, it doesn't hurt so bad when someone laughs at me because I know something you don't know I know ..... nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
Yes, I know, sudden panic for all of you reading this who know me. "Eak, did she peek in MY closet?!" "Did she snoop in MY drawer." Yup, I'm sure I have .... and probably your wallet, under your bed, behind your couch, your notes-to-self ..... why? Curiosity. I love to see what goes on in other people's heads when no one is looking .... not to hurt anyone or betray them .... just to know more, I guess. I've always been that way ..... yes, by the age of 10, I could have offered Harriet the Spy a tip or two. Apparently, my mom does this as well. She's the only other person I know who will pick up a folded piece of paper on the ground just to see if it is a private note .... and yes, people ..... many of them are.
No mail in my mailbox today. I find this fishy. You know those really nice mailpeople who walk around smiling and waving as they joyously deliver letters? That's not my mailperson. I suspect that my mailperson is the type to get stung by a butterfly, to break a tooth on the only half of olive pit in the whole jar, to throw the penny over the wishing well, to be the one person in all eternity on the entire planet who ever actually bit into a razor blade in a piece of Halloween candy, to get drenched when the sun is out ..... okay, fine, so I left my sprinkler on that time .... sheesh.
What happened to rain, sleet, snow or hail, the mail will be there ... or something like that? For my mailperson, it's more like rain, sleet, snow, hail, breeze, sunny day, cloudy day, perfect day, any day, I'm sitting my ass right here and if I can't reach your mailbox with my curled up pinky finger, well, then you have a faulty mailbox. How do I know this? Why just last week, I received the dozenth Post Office Notice: Dear Resident at XXXX, Your mailbox is sitting too far from the curb. Please correct this problem or your mail will cease to be delivered. When the HELL did postal people start expecting mailboxes to come to them?!?
Ya want the kicker? I wasn't living here when my mailbox was steadfastly erected. I was negative two years old! But, just last year, the county built a nice new curb on our road and apparently, my mailbox moved itself six inches farther away from the road. So, I took this dozenth Dear Resident at XXXXX, Your mailbox is sitting too far from the curb letter and crossed out that nonsense. I wrote, Dear Mailperson, Your truck is crooked. Please fix your mailtruck as soon as possible so I may continue to receive my mail. Yes, I really did put it in the mailbox and raise the little red flag .... now you see my suspicion over receiving no mail today. Apparently, some people have NO sense of humor. I think I might move the mailbox to suit her fancy, but at the same time replace it with a tiny one in which each letter has to be folded and stuffed in forcefully. Hmmmmmm ..... I can see her note now. Dear Resident at XXXXXX, A zillion heartfelt apologies and hugs. Please put back your old mailbox. Your Friendly Neighborhood Postal Worker Eager to Bring Your Mail Come Rain or Shine
Backing up half a page to me renaming those I love and cherish as celebrities to disguise their true identity, hence, prolonging my life. I spent most of last week gushing to Daryl Hannah that Saturday night I was hired to help host an event where I would get to don an outrageous senorita costume - complete with a real-hair, black wig. That was the best part! Saturday came and went, and reluctantly I was forced to give back the $2,000 wig. Bummer. Ah-ha! I went home and dyed my own hair jet black, and guess what?! It came out just like the wig ..... okay, maybe a $20 Walmart wig, but close enough!
Yeah, finally, my badboy self had come to the surface. Hello dark, mysterious, intimidating, newly reinvented moi! Since I've known Daryl Hannah for 14 years and she is one of my closest friends, I warned her before popping out excitedly with my outrageously solid black hair. "Daryl!" said I, "I must warn you. I have dyed my hair. It is quite shocking!" Like a child yelling "boo!" I excitedly leaped around the corner to meet her shocked expression, expecting us to both wallow in my carefree, daring, adventurous euphoria.
But, she laughed quite heartily and, in between hunched-over hysteria, I finally heard her mumble, "So, that's the wig you were so excited to wear Saturday night!" "Um, no. This is really my hair. I liked the wig so much, I dyed my hair just like it!" A brief pause and mortified expression shrouded her brow, knowing she had just irreparably put her foot into her mouth, but instead of growing pensive and apologetic (well, what the heck, she had passed the point of no return anyway), she burst out laughing even more at her own goofy blunder - a situation that looked eerily familiar, except I was usually the one suffering the uncontrollable fits of hysteria under someone else's angry glare.
Chuckle as I did, I could not keep up and finally my own gush of laughter faded to a drip, and then a horrified okay-you-can-stop-laughing-now expression .... growing even more horrified as I realized there was no end in sight to her hysteria. Broken and beaten, I slunk away like a child hit with the dodge ball. "Come back, I'm, I'm .... hahahahahaha." I knew Daryl was trying desperately to contain herself and spit out a sincere apology. I love Daryl immensely and we both knew that this little rock in the road of our longtime friendship would have no negative bearing on the future of our friendship. However, I had desperately wanted us to rejoice together, not her alone laughing at pathetically sad me.
But hours later, after we had hugged, made up and laughed about the whole thing, I burst out laughing when I realized she really had thought it was a wig and I was playing a joke. Of course, that IS something I would really do, so of course Daryl might think that. I still laugh each time I remember us hugging and laughing and her sheepishly recounting how her first thought when I came jumping out was, "What a crazy wig!" Yeah, and what a crazy broad it's attached to, I thought to myself!
Well, I suppose I am lucky that my real hair looks like a wig on my head instead of my hair adorning a wig on someone else's head. Whose hair was in that wig Saturday anyway?! What spurred her and her hair to part ways (is that NOT the best pun ever?!!)? At least I knew myself and my hair would still be on the same path at day's end .... where that path would be, who knew, but my hair would be there with the secure hug it always offered come rain or shine, sleet or hail, snow or wind ..... my head would never be too far away for my hair to reach.
1. Must stop talking to myself outside of my house with lips moving.
2. Must stop using the word "freakin'" as the all-purpose adjective/adverb. I am getting on my own nerves. This has gone too far.
3. Must live up to my own expectations, not others.
4. If I'm going to thumb my nose at the world and dye my hair gothic black with attitude, must not cry when people laugh. What a sissypants! I don't deserve badboy black hair!
5. Must get a really cool infection in my finger, and truly let it fester this time to see what happens. Ten fingers are SO over-rated. You can only pick your nose with one anyway.
6. Must stop trying to hard to fix the world ... fix myself ... then work on the world.
I've decided that when I need to tell a story that involves someone I know, I am going to rename this person the name of a celebrity of similar looks and personality so no one will get mad at me. Even my brother has gotten to the point of saying, "Heath, I'll tell you this but it is NOT to go into your novel." Sheesh ... as if I can't be trusted. I've snooped in dozens of diaries, emails, notebooks, underwear drawers, bathroom cabinets and anything else anywhere I can get my nosy little hands on ... but have I ever once revealed the awesome dark secrets I've uncovered? NO. Not once. I keep these juicy tidbits all to myself. That way, it doesn't hurt so bad when someone laughs at me because I know something you don't know I know ..... nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
Yes, I know, sudden panic for all of you reading this who know me. "Eak, did she peek in MY closet?!" "Did she snoop in MY drawer." Yup, I'm sure I have .... and probably your wallet, under your bed, behind your couch, your notes-to-self ..... why? Curiosity. I love to see what goes on in other people's heads when no one is looking .... not to hurt anyone or betray them .... just to know more, I guess. I've always been that way ..... yes, by the age of 10, I could have offered Harriet the Spy a tip or two. Apparently, my mom does this as well. She's the only other person I know who will pick up a folded piece of paper on the ground just to see if it is a private note .... and yes, people ..... many of them are.
No mail in my mailbox today. I find this fishy. You know those really nice mailpeople who walk around smiling and waving as they joyously deliver letters? That's not my mailperson. I suspect that my mailperson is the type to get stung by a butterfly, to break a tooth on the only half of olive pit in the whole jar, to throw the penny over the wishing well, to be the one person in all eternity on the entire planet who ever actually bit into a razor blade in a piece of Halloween candy, to get drenched when the sun is out ..... okay, fine, so I left my sprinkler on that time .... sheesh.
What happened to rain, sleet, snow or hail, the mail will be there ... or something like that? For my mailperson, it's more like rain, sleet, snow, hail, breeze, sunny day, cloudy day, perfect day, any day, I'm sitting my ass right here and if I can't reach your mailbox with my curled up pinky finger, well, then you have a faulty mailbox. How do I know this? Why just last week, I received the dozenth Post Office Notice: Dear Resident at XXXX, Your mailbox is sitting too far from the curb. Please correct this problem or your mail will cease to be delivered. When the HELL did postal people start expecting mailboxes to come to them?!?
Ya want the kicker? I wasn't living here when my mailbox was steadfastly erected. I was negative two years old! But, just last year, the county built a nice new curb on our road and apparently, my mailbox moved itself six inches farther away from the road. So, I took this dozenth Dear Resident at XXXXX, Your mailbox is sitting too far from the curb letter and crossed out that nonsense. I wrote, Dear Mailperson, Your truck is crooked. Please fix your mailtruck as soon as possible so I may continue to receive my mail. Yes, I really did put it in the mailbox and raise the little red flag .... now you see my suspicion over receiving no mail today. Apparently, some people have NO sense of humor. I think I might move the mailbox to suit her fancy, but at the same time replace it with a tiny one in which each letter has to be folded and stuffed in forcefully. Hmmmmmm ..... I can see her note now. Dear Resident at XXXXXX, A zillion heartfelt apologies and hugs. Please put back your old mailbox. Your Friendly Neighborhood Postal Worker Eager to Bring Your Mail Come Rain or Shine
Backing up half a page to me renaming those I love and cherish as celebrities to disguise their true identity, hence, prolonging my life. I spent most of last week gushing to Daryl Hannah that Saturday night I was hired to help host an event where I would get to don an outrageous senorita costume - complete with a real-hair, black wig. That was the best part! Saturday came and went, and reluctantly I was forced to give back the $2,000 wig. Bummer. Ah-ha! I went home and dyed my own hair jet black, and guess what?! It came out just like the wig ..... okay, maybe a $20 Walmart wig, but close enough!
Yeah, finally, my badboy self had come to the surface. Hello dark, mysterious, intimidating, newly reinvented moi! Since I've known Daryl Hannah for 14 years and she is one of my closest friends, I warned her before popping out excitedly with my outrageously solid black hair. "Daryl!" said I, "I must warn you. I have dyed my hair. It is quite shocking!" Like a child yelling "boo!" I excitedly leaped around the corner to meet her shocked expression, expecting us to both wallow in my carefree, daring, adventurous euphoria.
But, she laughed quite heartily and, in between hunched-over hysteria, I finally heard her mumble, "So, that's the wig you were so excited to wear Saturday night!" "Um, no. This is really my hair. I liked the wig so much, I dyed my hair just like it!" A brief pause and mortified expression shrouded her brow, knowing she had just irreparably put her foot into her mouth, but instead of growing pensive and apologetic (well, what the heck, she had passed the point of no return anyway), she burst out laughing even more at her own goofy blunder - a situation that looked eerily familiar, except I was usually the one suffering the uncontrollable fits of hysteria under someone else's angry glare.
Chuckle as I did, I could not keep up and finally my own gush of laughter faded to a drip, and then a horrified okay-you-can-stop-laughing-now expression .... growing even more horrified as I realized there was no end in sight to her hysteria. Broken and beaten, I slunk away like a child hit with the dodge ball. "Come back, I'm, I'm .... hahahahahaha." I knew Daryl was trying desperately to contain herself and spit out a sincere apology. I love Daryl immensely and we both knew that this little rock in the road of our longtime friendship would have no negative bearing on the future of our friendship. However, I had desperately wanted us to rejoice together, not her alone laughing at pathetically sad me.
But hours later, after we had hugged, made up and laughed about the whole thing, I burst out laughing when I realized she really had thought it was a wig and I was playing a joke. Of course, that IS something I would really do, so of course Daryl might think that. I still laugh each time I remember us hugging and laughing and her sheepishly recounting how her first thought when I came jumping out was, "What a crazy wig!" Yeah, and what a crazy broad it's attached to, I thought to myself!
Well, I suppose I am lucky that my real hair looks like a wig on my head instead of my hair adorning a wig on someone else's head. Whose hair was in that wig Saturday anyway?! What spurred her and her hair to part ways (is that NOT the best pun ever?!!)? At least I knew myself and my hair would still be on the same path at day's end .... where that path would be, who knew, but my hair would be there with the secure hug it always offered come rain or shine, sleet or hail, snow or wind ..... my head would never be too far away for my hair to reach.
posted by Heather | 8:01 PM
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