There have been times in my life the last few years when the theme of the moment seemed to be poop, and all the cleaning of it I had to do. Now the theme of my life seems to be hair (or lack thereof, in Nora’s case).
Our vacuum chose the highly inopportune time of right before Christmas to die. Anytime is an inopportune time in this hairy house, but Christmas was worse with the plethora of Christmas tree needles. So, for a few weeks I only had a very weak vacuum to use, and the dog hair has piled up. Poor Nora is covered in it after playing on the floor, despite being on a blanket. And, I can’t even properly brush the hairy dog because she tore another ligament (she did the back right 2 years ago and the back left over New Year’s) and she won’t let me near the back. If I weren’t so annoyed with the hairy dog, I would feel sorry for the sight of her limping around the house.
But it’s not only dog hair that is the theme of life right now, it is also human hair. Or, more specifically, little girl hair. I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time coming tangles out of Ella’s hair, listening to her cry as I do so, and attempting to make her hair look neat with ponytails, braids, headbands, etc. And, yet, after all of this time, I still feel like I need to attend remedial hair class. Why does her hair never look as neat or cute as I want it to? What am I doing wrong–other than forcing tears and yells out of her as I comb?
I always wanted long hair when I was little. I always hated the short haircuts my mom made me get, especially the Dorothy Hamill cut (I still hold a grudge against Dorothy Hamill for that). But I can see now why my mom cut my hair (though I will never understand the awful Hamill cut). Ella’s hair is just like mine, thin and naturally snarly. I am tempted get her hair cut shorter, but then will I wonder what I have become? There has to be something non-Dorothy that is cute, and I will find it. At least, I will probably fail in the attempt.
In unrelated news, Ella is sick with some sort of stomach bug. I spent a lot of yesterday cleaning up pools of sick and praying that none of the rest of us gets it. The only other time Ella was this sort of sick was in an airport, so I did not have to clean up the mess (I actually wore most of it). I guess it is some sort of mom rite-of-passage to clean up after a sick kid. Next time I will be a little smarter and get a sheet out for the couch right away so I can avoid having to take the covers off the cushions to be washed. Experience, as they say, is the best teacher, though I wish I could learn about cleaning up throw up only in theory.
Is it okay to admit that I chuckled through most of this post?