1. The time I was thrown away from the hairdressers...
One day, me ol' Mum took me and Ja Ja (miniature Hannan) to the hairchoppers to get all spruced up. Probably it was the summer holidays. We were children then, and sometimes we got to sit in the children's chair which was usually in the shape of an aeroplane or racing car. So I was sitting in the cool racing car getting my hair combed when the hairdresser stopped combing, turned to my Mum and said "I am afraid I cannot continue. THIS CHILD has headlice"...
HOW embarrassing. Mum rushed us both out of the shop and filled a turban up with that headlice shampoo to get rid. Even now, I sit with my hands gripping the chair, my eyes flitting nervously around the room, trying to avoid eye contact in the mirror waiting to hear those immortal words... "I cannot continue. This woman has headlice!" It hasn't happened since then though so I really shouldn't worry.
2. The time my inability to say 'no' caused a problem with me' barnet...
I was a younger Hannan but not a child. That awkward bit in the middle of grown up and grown down when you're not sure where to put your arms when you stand there, you're learning how to do stuff on your own and you have to speak for yourself... I was having my hair cut on my own for the first time and it got to the bit where she shows you the back in the mirror and asks "How's that love?" I could clearly see without a doubt that one side of my hair was longer than the other at the front. I knew I had to speak up, say SOMETHING Hannan! Come on! You'll be the laughing stock at school! Yet alas... my stupid old mouth let me down and before I knew it I was walking out of the shop having told her that "Yes it looks lovely, thank you very much". My Mum took one look at me when she picked me up and sent me straight back up to the woman to tell her to sort this mess out. The woman looked again and "oh yes I see, OK let's sort this out". She did a few snip snippys and I left the shop with even shorter hair...that was still wonky... I refused to go back a third time and just had to keep putting it behind my ears for a few weeks. No biggie.
3. The time I looked ridiculous...again.
Once, my Mum decided she was fed up with me looking pretty like a girl and decided that I should have all my lovely Rapunzel hair cut away. Kindness, Mama. It ended up being more like a bob (actually would be very trendy nowadays) but the problem was that it was bob-ish at the front but went all the way up to NOTHING at the back! I had legit boy hair at the back. I even had that silly 'v' of hair in the nape of my neck. It was a horrific era of school those days as it was without having a little point of hair for them all to tug on. All day long I got tugged at and laughed at. I was so fed up. And to add salt to the wound my friend Liz had luscious long locks. When she put a jumper on her hair would stay in her jumper "keeping her neck warm" so she would say. I had a cold neck every winter :(
4. The time Mum got snip happy
Now this isn't what it sounds like. Mum has never messed up my hair by snipping it. OK, we went on holiday once, possibly to France, and I got one of those beautiful hair braids wrapped all around my hair. It had many different colours, beads at the end and even used glittery thread! I loved it! However, my hero of a school decided it wasn't in the uniform policy and we had to remove all such lovely things before September. My Mum had a little (tiny) go at removing it with her hands (the conventional way) before giving up and simply snipping it off at the top...
...leaving a tiny sprout of hair on the top of my head by my parting that stayed for MONTHS until it had caught up with the rest of my hair.
By the way, having re-read this blog, Megatron is coming off in a fairly bad light... let me stress that there were thousands of hair related times that went very well thanks to my Mum. Like the time she got glitter powder for me that I could put in it, that was nice. And the time she painted the bottom bit of my hair bright pink so I could be hip and with it, that was cool too.
If you were a psychologist you may say that the reason I have long hair now is to meet unfulfilled childhood desires. Maybe. Or maybe I just avoid getting the hairs on my noggin snipped because of all the disastrous reasons above.
Both I think.
Love Hannan :)
