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Posts Tagged ‘Hair’

Dudes in Drag

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , on March 7, 2023| 2 Comments »

When I was at Camp St Joseph for Girls, I sang “If Ever I Would Leave You” in drag. I was maybe 13 or 14 and the nuns thought nothing of it. Since I was the tallest camper who could carry a tune, I was dressed as Sir Lancelot in Camelot. Is it called drag when girls dress like boys and perform musical comedy hits, like Victor Victoria? What about Shakespeare, where men always played women?

Back in the day, I’ve witnessed many a guy on stage dressed like a Hawaiian Hula dancer. The trope is funny, with coconuts on their hairy chest. Mostly it was the big, brawny football types who felt secure enough in their own masculinity to don womens’ clothes. I’d never even heard of drag until I was in my 30s and we went to a bar in Key West. Our Big Chill group took up a sizable part of the audience and we had tons of fun.

And now here I am in Nashville with a Drag Star Hair Stylist!

Tennessee is the first state in the union to ban public displays of drag to “PROTECT” our children. What exactly are we protecting them from… ? TN Republican legislators say drag is “harmful to minors;”  They called it an “adult cabaret” that would “appeal to a prurient nature.” My hair stylist in his alter ego, aka The Britney Banks, attended one of the protests. He/she held a sign that said

“Trust Politicians PARENTS”

I absolutely cannot trust politicians to keep our children safe. Safe from what, from learning their own history in school?

Safe from what? reading books that may make them uncomfortable?

Have politicians kept our children safe in their schools? Yesterday, I bought three purple Columbine plants for my garden, and every time I say that word, Columbine, I feel that tragedy deep in my bones; when two teenage boys killed 13 students and teachers and wounded more than 20 in 1999.

Politicians however, have voted against enhanced background checks after Sandy Hook, where six adults and 20 CHILDREN were murdered. They did nothing again after Uvalde, where 19 children and 2 teachers were gunned down. Children are simply pawns to be sacrificed on the altar of Republican Greed. If you haven’t heard Jon Stewart parry with Oklahoma Republican State Legislator Nathan Dahm you’re in for a treat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCuIxIJBfCY

It’s a bit long – they must go through a series of free speech and 2nd Amendment chaos – but wait till the end. Stewart asks Dahm if it’s true that he doesn’t like drag queens reading to children. Oh my, well of course that’s true. Then Stewart, with righteous indignation in his eyes, asks him why it’s OK to infringe on free speech but not OK to regulate firearms? And Stewart’s trick question is, “DO you know what the leading cause of death is for children?”

It’s not drag queen readings. It’s GUNS!! Yes, now guns surpass motor vehicle collisions, and unlike adults, where the majority of gun deaths are suicides, “…for children, 65% of firearm deaths are homicides and 35% are categorized as suicide.” I guess there is the occasional accidental suicide when a toddler finds mommy’s gun in her purse and shoots himself, but honestly 65% of firearm deaths are murders! And our leaders cannot even reinstate the Assault Weapon Ban?

Why can’t we treat a gun like a car? I used to ride in the front seat with my Daddy Jim. Every time he braked, his arm swung over and pushed me back in my seat. I even did it for awhile with my kids, who used to sprawl all over the back seat to and from the beach with towels and dogs running rampant. Kids are not dying in cars as much anymore because politicians have passed regulations that require parents to take certain measures and buy car seats and not even let them sit in front until they reach a certain height…

Bless Gov Lee’s heart, his priority is not exposing children to Drag Queens, but hey, the more guns the merrier! I wonder when his Christian cohorts will want to end bachelorette parties in Nashville? Or Purim costumes for that matter at a synagogue, where a man recently dressed as Queen Esther. Are we going to infringe on religion? You get my drift. These two know and love my aforementioned hairstylist, and I’m more than OK with that!

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Buzzy Bees

Posted in an expository essay, Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 24, 2020| 7 Comments »

Yesterday I had to bite the bullet, I buzzed Bob’s head! He bought this Norelco hair trimmer weeks ago and I was secretly hoping I wouldn’t have to use it, but after watching a few YouTube videos I mustered my courage. He sat outside in the garden with a dish towel over his shoulders and I got to work. The buzzer had 100 attachments but I only used 4; one for the back, one for the top, two for around the ears and a small trimmer. It wasn’t so bad and I only left one small lightning stripe over an ear.

A runner cruised by and asked if he could be next!

But my next step was starting dinner. I defrosted some pork chops and began assembling the ingredients for rice and beans – shallots, garlic, rice, fire roasted tomatoes, and black beans. My chopping block now stands next to the sink, since my kitchen island has turned into a cutting table for our mask making endeavor. We have already made dozens of masks from donated material and tee shirts.

This week we delivered five masks to Great Grandma Ada and Hudson so that they could supply their friends. The routine so far is that we knock on the locked door and the receptionist opens it to exchange our bag of masks for their drugs. Then we sit in the vestibule and while Bob sorts their medications I talk on the phone, through the window, to Ada. But our last visit didn’t work so well.

First of all, the vestibule is a mini-Grand Central Station. Aides, physical therapists, private aides, and kitchen workers pass through every few minutes and every single one of them must stop… and knock… and have their temperature taken at the door. In the vestibule. One time a maintenance guy came in and started rolling up the carpet under our feet.

But the last time it was a piece of pecan pie that created the log jam. While one son (Bob), a doctor sorting his parents’ meds was sitting behind a table, another son came into the vestibule with his wife to deliver a piece of pie to his mother. And while one private duty aide was leaving and the receptionist had the door open, all four people, within arm’s length of each other, started into talking about pie. Granted they all had masks on, still it was getting crowded in there.

And although I found this conversation interesting, Bob was less than pleased, so he said, “Would you mind taking your conversation about pie outside?”

You would have thought he asked them to practice social distancing or something. In retrospect, I can tell when Bob switches into doctor mode where compliance is a given. It seems that everybody is a bit on edge these days, and long term care facilities are getting their fair share of bad coronavirus news. So the pecan pie fuse was lit, and the aide had a bit of a temper tantrum walking around outside, telling people that guy, my guy, doesn’t own the air. Calling him names while the receptionist disappeared and the couple stormed off to call in a complaint.

And it would have been comical if this wasn’t a life and death situation. I might have chalked it up to a misunderstanding over the Mason-Dixon line; we Yanks aren’t great at small talk, we get right to the point. But since Bob is also a caregiver, besides being family, going forward this “vestibule” arrangement isn’t sustainable. This semi-lockdown was the facility’s idea; aides go in and out of Ada and Hudson’s apartment all the time, to empty the garbage and deliver meals, and they only recently started wearing masks.

According to the CDC 20% of healthcare workers are infected with the virus, but they didn’t count long term care or nursing homes:

“The CDC’s report indicated most of the cases were white women in their 40s, according to The Washington Post.

Women made up the vast majority of cases at 73%, according to The Hill. Many of the infected professionals — about 38% — had underlying health conditions, and most of those who died from COVID-19 were 65 years or older, The Hill reported.

The report likely under counts the number of cases among medical professionals because of a lack of testing in a given region, The Post reported. There are also a number of institutions that are not testing health care workers in order to reserve tests for patients, according to The Post.”  https://www.miamiherald.com/news/coronavirus/article242019511.html

Instead of buzzing around like bees over gossip and horrible ravings about drinking or injecting disinfectant to kill the virus, let’s give ourselves a break and try listening to scientists. Here is a great article about two countries that are doing just that! https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/24/world/australia/new-zealand-coronavirus.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

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Nashville Normal

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , on March 9, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Italy has quarantined 16 Million people. Meghan and Harry are finishing up their official royal duties. And Bob and I have moved back into our home after the tornado because we have our power back!

Women all over the world were marching yesterday for equal rights in support of International Women’s Day. Fighting for equality, and the right not to be raped. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51791335

The NY Stock Market had to suspend trading this morning because of its torrential fall. It’s hard to watch for retirees like us. And it’s not just here, a sharp drop in oil prices has had a domino effect around the world. Today has a name, “Black Monday.”

But in our little world, the lights have come back on; and the outpouring of love and support for our community continues and is life affirming. Every single day, a restaurant or a church or a group of people show up with a barbeque grill in a parking lot dispensing hot meals and drinks to everyone. We share our stories, our extra bedrooms and bathrooms. We sweep and clean and pick insulation out of fences. We’ve moved back into our house.

Yesterday I tried getting back to “normal.”

I went to the Publix and was determined to cook dinner. It was jam-packed with young people probably moving back into apartment buildings since the tornado touched down, that is if their building wasn’t condemned. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/vista-germantown-condemned/ar-BB10LG80 I asked the young Black girl packing my groceries if she was alright, she lives in North she said. We had quite a heart to heart right there.

It’s funny how I’d just been explaining what “small talk” is with the Grands. We don’t do much of it now, it’s all deep talk.

I had my first Pilates lesson with a friend of the Bride whose studio is right down the street. Her building, an arts cooperative, didn’t have power yet but it was 68 degrees and sunny. Rebekah helped me heal my arthritic parts, she dispensed her knowledge with love. She lives in East.

Bob walked me to her studio so he could stop by our favorite Japanese restaurant and talk with neighbors – they were serving chili on the patio. Then he planted his raised bed with winter vegetables. I kept thinking, spring is coming, it’s such a beautiful day and yet so many people are still suffering, what else can we do? I already mentioned Crossroad Pets, their employees are in hotels and their animals are in foster care now. But a donation their way would be incredible. https://interland3.donorperfect.net/weblink/weblink.aspx?name=E330162&id=1

Here are some  more organizations that are on the ground in Nashville if you’d like to help:

The Community Foundation of Middle TN – https://www.cfmt.org/

Middle TN Emergency Response Fund – https://www.cfmt.org/giving-and-investing/become-a-donor/give-to-a-fund/middle-tennessee-emergency-response-fund/

To find out what else you can do, visit https://www.nashvilledowntown.com/events/numnashvillestrong-tornado-relief

We’ve dropped off diapers and batteries, and now the big machines are coming in and clearing out. Picking phone poles out of trees. Our neighborhood is a patchwork quilt of blue tarp roofs. But the Farmer’s Market has reopened and last night I made comfort food.

The CDC is warning “old” people not to travel, to stay home. I’m happy cocooning in place; we have lights and heat and wifi! When we were prepping for the coronavirus, I never thought we’d be hit by a tornado. Normal, whatever that is, in Nashville will never be the same. Oh, and I dyed my hair pink.

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Redhead Endangered

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , on August 15, 2011| 2 Comments »

Just sent my friend from high school, the only other redhead in our class, a Huffington Post article titled “Being a Redhead: Why it’s a Love-Hate Relationship.” It talks about the common theme of feeling different, even scorned by our peers.

For most of us Titian-types, we would have gladly dyed our hair a darker camouflage color. I can remember desperately wanting black hair in Sacred Heart School; I felt like a beacon for any nun’s wrath sitting there in my dark maroon (think blood colored) uniform, hands clasped together on desk, a bow tie at my neck, with my halo of strawberry blonde hair. The Post author, Katherine Bindley, takes the historic view: “…red hair is often the mark of sin. The roster of corrupted redheads includes Eve, after she had been seduced by Satan, Cain, after he offed his brother, and everyone’s favorite disciple, Judas. Redheaded Mary Magdalenes are also common, emphasizing what a harlot Jesus had the compassion to befriend.” There is even a term coined in the UK for hatred of redheaded people – gingerism.

Cut to today. It was my man, Bob, coming up out of anesthesia after yet another shoulder surgery, who turned to the recovery room nurse and asked for his wife, “The Redhead,” in the waiting room. At that point my golden highlights had pretty much morphed into an ashy grey white, and I decided to turn back the clock and embrace my redheadedness. I dove wantonly right into the depths of red high and lowlights, wanting to look more or less like myself for the wedding photos. Will the true Gingers among us please standup! Could we reds become extinct soon? I was the only child, out of six, to have red hair. My Mother, the Flapper, was a blonde. But my Grandmother was a redhead. Here is the genetic mumbo jumbo from the website How Stuff Works:

“Red hair is caused by a mutation in the MC1R gene. It’s also a recessive trait, so it takes both parents passing on a mutated version of the MC1R gene to produce a redheaded child. Because it’s a recessive trait, red hair can easily skip a generation. It can then reappear after skipping one or more generations if both parents, no matter their hair color, carry the red hair gene.” All is not lost! The Rocker’s beard is mahogany and the Groom, being part Irish…it’s time to take back our red roots. Claim the color ladies, bottle or not. Look at our cousin, the angelic redheaded Flower Girl. It’s time to teach our children that different=delightful.

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