When "You got the Look"

     This blog is dedicated to my old friend Laura Richards. Today I saw your beautiful face on Facebook and felt that you needed to know all the fun times I remember with you. But most importantly I wanted to write about our bangs.

    It was fall of 1988 when I met her, Laura Richards. She had a cute face and dark straight hair and she was a new student at Kittrell elementary. Over the next summer, I spent more time at her house, eating Dorito chips and playing the Legend of Zelda. We were soon heading to junior high, and Laura had already started "doing her hair." I could tell that everyone was noticing. I wanted to get noticed too, but I didn't know how to transform my look. Fortunately for Laura, she had an older sister who knew the tricks. One day her sister Michelle came into the room as we were playing on the Nintendo.

  

     Michelle was two years older than us and had cool hair. What I mean by cool are high bangs. She was going into 8^th grade and she knew how to dress, how to talk, and how to do hair. So gathering courage I asked her, “Michelle, would you teach me how to do my hair?”

      Up until that moment I hadn’t touched my hair much. I had a boomerang perm that left my hair in tiny corkscrew curls all over my head. But all I knew how to do was to wash it and put some gel in it. My bangs hung down in my eyes so I tried to push them back with a plastic headband.

    She turned to me studying my hair. Squinting in creative thought she finally replied, “I think I know what we will have to do, but it means wetting it down and starting all over, are you ready for that?” She challenged.

With an excited gulp, I said, “Yes.”

       So we marched off to the bathroom to wet down my hair. Soon discovering my hair was a mess much like a ball of mushy spaghetti noodles, we added conditioner. After a thorough comb through and rinse, she wrapped my hair in a towel twisted sophisticatedly on top of my head.

“Now Dianne, what I am about to tell you will change your sixth-grade year dramatically. If you follow the directions I am about to give you, your hair will look good every day.” She instructed.

    I nodded at her through the mirror. “Alright then, we will proceed,” she said with focused energy.

She unwound the towel and had me flip my head down. Next, she applied Aussie gel to my hair. I loved the grapey scent as she worked it through each curl.

“Now scrunch your hair,” she said.

     So taking my hands I started squeezing my hair while making fists. Then she handed me a strange shaped hair dryer called a diffuser and told me to dry my hair upside down. So bent over and I began blow drying my hair.  When it was half way dry she told me to flip my hair over. I gasped when I saw the huge curly mane staring back at me.

“The key to sixth-grade success Dianne is big hair.” She whispered near my ear.

Next, she opened the medicine cabinet and something like an electric guitar solo from White Snake played as she pulled out her purple can of Aqua Net Aerosol Hairspray.

“This is going to be your best friend Dianne, your best friend!”

     I studied the can of hair spray wondering what magical benefits it must possess. Taking out her fine toothed comb she parted my hair to the side. Suddenly I had a measurable volume shift. Taking a 3/8" curling iron she curled my bangs in the direction of my new part. Then she did what I only dreamed about. She took the comb and lifted my permed bangs 3 inches high and with a stream of hairspray coated them. Then before I could even blink she held the blow dryer one inch away from the damp hair. After drying the Aqua Net bangs they stood up without the comb. Then she started “ratting” them until I had high bangs.

     I stood in front of the mirror dumbfounded, who was this girl? All I needed now was hot pink lip gloss, blue eyeliner, and a pair of stonewashed Guess jeans and I would be set for the upcoming school year. As I came into the room to show Laura my new look she just laughed. and said, "Michelle you did it again."

    Little did I know how much better the year would go when "you got the look". Thanks Michelle and Laura. The problem is I am almost 40 and I still have the same hair style. Michelle, come quick! I need you to coach me on how to fit in with the moms of my upcoming 6^th grader. Does the awkwardness ever end?