Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Let Down Your Hair!

So, remember when I told you I was going bald? I was trying to be funny and light-hearted and all that crap but, really, I was a little nervous about it. You know how when you are pregnant, you see ALL these other pregnant women and you think, "Wow, everyone else is pregnant, too!", when, in reality, there were just as many women pregnant around when you were non-pregnant, you just never noticed them!

Same exact thing with going bald. All of a sudden, I noticed all these other women my age who had, like, seriously thinning hair. I mean seriously. Where did all these women come from? How come I never noticed them before? And, last and by far most important, AM I GOING TO LOOK LIKE THAT? But. At least at this point, it seems to have stopped falling out. I mean, I still get random hairs in the shower and on the sink but it's just a few here and there. It's not like the wads I was taking out of the shower drain after every single shower. So, I'm thinking (and hoping) maybe it was a fluke. A one time thing. A surge in hormones. Or it could have been my hairdresser.

I mentioned my hairdresser (who knows nothing about this blog so I can LAY HER OUT) in another post about divorce and how I felt sorry for her, divorcing after 14 years of marriage. Well, I take it all back.

She and I had a knock-down, drag out fight last time she did my hair and if she didn't normally do such a good job and I hadn't been going to her for years and if I wasn't a wuss about finding someone else to do my hair, I would totally never go back. She refused to admit that she had made my hair a different color the last time she colored it. Adamantly refused. Even though I was sitting there with a different color on my hair and everyone had agreed with me that, yes indeed, it was a different color, she insisted that she had done exactly the same thing and it must have been my hormones. My hormones turned my hair from a pretty strawberry blonde to a brassy, metallic looking dark blonde? Uh, no. I know hormones can do crazy things, including messing with your hair but it WAS A DIFFERENT COLOR.

I was insistent, she was insistent, it became kind of embarrassing because the other stylists were all listening and shuffling their feet and acting like they couldn't hear.

Anyway. We worked it out. She fixed the color. It's still not perfect, but it's better. And now I'm thinking. When my hair was falling out was one of the times she had made it kind of a weird, darker blonde. I'm sure she wouldn't do it on purpose because, really what kind of as stylist doesn't want return business, but maybe...while she was thinking about her cheatin' husband...she mixed up the dye a little too strong.

I'm hoping that was it. And it was just a one time thing. And also. I'm thinking now maybe it's not a good idea to piss off the person who was maybe responsible for making some of my hair fall out. I really don't want any more to fall out. So maybe I just won't worry if the color of my hair is not exactly right.

As long as it's all there.

Everyone is Divorced

Everyone I know is divorced. OK, that may be a slight exaggeration. But not by much. It seems like everyone I know is either divorced, married for the second (or third, or fourth...) time or is in the process of getting a divorce. Most of the people I work with have been divorced. One teacher at my school recently went though a bitter, hurtful divorce that will affect the rest of her life. Most of my friends are divorced, some after years and years of marriage. 20 years. 30 years. Some are remarried. Some are alone and looking for someone special. I hope and pray they find that person. Some have quit looking and say they will never marry again. They have been too hurt. They are not willing to face that possibility again.


I went to get my hair cut and colored and streaked the other day (God, what we go through to look beeyootiful) and, when I asked my hairdresser about her annual trip to the Jersey shore, she quietly said they wouldn't be going this year. Just being chatty and friendly, I wondered aloud why they weren't going, they had gone every year, I knew she loved it there. And she replied that she and her husband were getting a divorce. After 14 years. It was a complete surprise to her. She's pretty sure there is someone else. He denies it. But he has been on a LOT of hunting trips, weekend trips where she can't reach him and long weekends away with lame excuses and working late and...well, I think she's right.


I have been at a technology conference the last couple of days and I ran into a friend I hadn't seen in a couple of years and how are you and what's new and how's your family and your husband...oh. Divorced. And he's remarried. Oh. Sorry. So sorry.


I can't imagine being divorced. I just can't imagine. Tom and I have had our ups and downs and I have yelled at him and I even, back in the old days before kids, dumped a pitcher of kool-aid in his lap one time. But we worked it out. We have never, even at the worst of times, come seriously close to divorce. Divorce has never been mentioned. We just...work things out. We yell. We talk. We laugh. We make up. We go on. We each have our own faults. (him MUCH more so than me, of course) But, we enjoy being together. We like the same things. And we have our own interests as well. We love our family. We have so many plans for the future. Retirement. Lots and lots of travel. Time with our family. We have so many shared experiences. So many shared memories. A word, a phrase, a sentence, can bring back a memory and make us laugh, share a glance, shake our heads. I can't imagine starting all over again with someone else. I can't imagine.


He knows I interrupt him in the middle of his sentences. He doesn't mind. He knows I am overweight. He doesn't mind. He knows I figure out the end of movies and often blurt it out to him. He doesn't mind. (well, he does but he lives with it) He knows I need to shop, need to eat out with my friends, need to spend time with other people sometimes. He doesn't mind. I went out with my friends for dinner just the other night. As I left, he said to have fun. Have fun. That's pretty nice. I'm pretty lucky. I try to tell him that often. That I'm lucky. That I love him. That I appreciate him. Sometimes I forget and it's not until I find out someone else is getting divorced that I remember to tell him.


I need to tell him more often. That I'm lucky. That I love him. That I appreciate him. Because I do. All the time. Even when someone else is not getting divorced.