Your hair – crowning glory or worst nightmare?

Mine has always been the bane of my existence. What is known in Spain as “pelo frito”. Fine and frizzy with a mind of its own and the plaything of even the slightest touch of humidity. All my life I have dreamed of having straight hair and cannot even begin to count the hours spent – nay wasted – with gels & sprays, tape, giant rollers, blowers & straighteners, hairbands & hats. All for nothing. When I was about 12 my father finally gave in to my constant pleas and paid to have my hair professionally straightened at a salon. Within a week my hair was back to its usual disagreeable self.

I longed to be one of those happy souls who could just wash their hair and go outside without further ado, or who could get caught in the rain, secure in the knowledge that they wouldn’t end up looking like they had a demented poodle sitting on their heads. In the 80s I watched in horror as women who had been blessed with the hair of my dreams got hideous perms that made them look, well, like me. Around that time I tried letting my hair dry while gelled back in a ponytail, but after its release from captivity would immediately spring back to its despised life. So in the end I just kept it gelled back and have been mostly wearing it that way for the past 25 years, except on rare days with 0% humidity or those few blessed hours immediately after having my hair cut and blow-dried to smithereens.

Yesterday was such a day. And it was soooo lovely while it lasted, that all too brief and bittersweet glimpse of what might have been…