Where there's heat, there's healthy hair
Channeling my 1998 kitchen
Other than the erosion of my fingerprints, I trust that writing these weekly newsletters will distill some of the muddier thoughts I have re: this memoir/essay collection that is incessantly knocking around in my skull. Also trust that if you have asked me when this book of mine will be completed, please know that I politely change the answer, and subject, each time.
To help me apply some pressure to the right areas, I started working with a wonderful creative coach. Morgan Mitchell builds little nests in my inbox every week filled with inspiration in the form of sound, color and text. She also includes poignant writing prompts which are crafted from monthly check-ins. She listens to my lofty goals and confused thoughts, and somehow transforms a rambling zoom call into actionable assignments that are helping me tremendously.
One of my goals this month was to give a more clear and multi-dimensional space to the memory of my childhood house.
I had a 3am note on my phone that said, ‘big brown microwave, thermasilk.’ I applied that memory trigger to her prompts and here’s the result of this week’s workshop:
I hop off the last step of the school bus with both feet landing at once and it sends a little jolt of pain to my knobby knees. I wince. I do not have the athletic sinewy build that most adolescents have from days spent running around outside. After years of eschewing fresh air in favor of video games and cable tv, I feel everything in my joints. I am a twelve year old girl with the bone structure of an eighty-four year old.
I amble the downhill path home, passing beautifully kept ranches and the odd century farmhouse. It’s a nine minute descent to my front door and by the time you get to our house, you can almost see the lip of the road where the bus dropped you off. Even if I were to sprint from the bottom of this cul-de-sac crater, it takes me double the amount of time to make the trip back out. I have come to realize I am far too lazy for a life of a runaway. The last time I tried, our live-in nanny caught up to me after barely a quarter of the way up. I gave up, a sobbing, wheezy mess, blubbing into my inhaler the few steps back to my front door. Unfortunately for her, I chose dinner time to run away. Because her caregiving reflexes kicked into gear so quickly, she had the severe misfortune forgetting to drop the giant chef’s knife as she chased me up our quiet street. She was replaced a few days later by another woman who’s name I can’t recall.
Immaculate front lawns signal this is where the type of adult lives who is too far from anything interesting to be distracted. With open slots in their calendars, their weekends can ease into wine-drenched block parties and tedious yard maintenance. Hands forever plucking out deadened petals from planters to reroute water from undeserving leaves. An acre of soft lawn might be the most useless crop in the world, but the sight of it sure is soothing to a middle aged parent, hungover on Sundays.
Shrubbery, flowering ivy, and perennials bric-a-brac their way up my driveway, which is the longest on the street. Once in the mudroom, I snub the heel of my shoes with opposing toes, while using both of my hands to turn the brass knobs. I smell my palms checking for the familiar scent of pennies. Our massive wooden door gives way to an all-ivory foyer that leads directly into our forested backyard. My mother is back there, multitasking in the way mothers do, casual, aggrieved. A bulky cordless phone rests between her ear-length crop of auburn hair and sun freckled shoulder. She’s watering violet geraniums from the hot tub, bikini straps tucked in to avoid tan lines. I skip saying hello and make a quick left into our kitchen.
The pastoral beauty of my walk home is replaced with a more arresting palette up close. Our shutters, our deck, and picket fence are sun yellow and cobalt blue. A “complimentary” mix of hues only my mom and the University of Michigan, confirms are in fashion. The bold colors continue into the kitchen. There is an attempt to soften with beige and grey flecked carpet. Our cabinetry is standard 90’s issue: white vinyl and fiberboard with an indented wooden edge acting as handle.
The microwave is the same plasticky brown as our wood paneled van. A film-coated surface covers the buttons which click like magic, conjuring up teal digital numbers. My fingers autopilot a sequence barely lifting off the pad, signaling to whatever mechanism inside to start rubbing up the water molecules, create heat and make my after school snack edible. Four minutes and thirty seconds to dick around the kitchen in silence, only the humming of this gargantuan microwave providing the soundtrack.
My siblings and I are on a frozen dinner kick. We’re currently fighting over the alfredo sauce one so my dad buys them fifteen at a time during his weekend shop. I prepare a side plate with my condiments at the ready: a pad of butter, a few dashes of Kraft parmesan, and enough salt to cure a fish. I don’t think about the ludicrous amount of crap that’s already in there. After all, I am twelve, it’s 1998 and Gwyneth Paltrow is too busy promoting Shakespeare in Love to think about her calling as a health guru yet. Body image pressures still come via subliminal messages, and I chose to ignore them.
Plus today a classmate asked at the top of their lungs, to no one in particular, why it suddenly smelled like Chinatown on garbage day. So, I threw away the chow mein lunch my dad had packed for me.
It’s late spring so I’ve propped the side door open, the metal screen half doing its job to keep out the bugs. Our house backs onto a forest, a small river, and a graveyard - so all sorts of weird shit comes crawling in here. Likely because of this I have a tremendous fear of spindly-legged things. My mom loves to take advantage of this “cute quirk” of mine by re-enacting every spider story she has. A recent one includes my less than favorite creature having a gladiator match with a frog under the kitchen table and winning. I’m trying not to picture the logistics of how that works, as my food nears readiness. I scan the room and walk over to the hutch that keeps our family photos on it.
My little sister stands out like a ray of sunshine in every photo, her green eyes match my mother’s. Her hair is a multi-dimensional, shimmering prism of blonde. It’s so startling because my brother, my dad, and I have inkblots atop our squinting faces. Sometimes in the heat of summer my head feels like an oil slick on hot pavement, but even that has more dimensionality than the matte charcoal strands that frame my face. If you ever wondered why Chinese women use parasols in the summer, it’s because our hair is on fucking fire.
All my favorite authors described their heroines as having hair of spun gold silk. Last week, my best friend told me about this new hair product called Thermasilk. Because I do not yet know that silk comes from worm casings - perhaps the most terrifying thing to have a head full of - I ran to her house ready for my new head of leading lady hair. After reading the directions, lather, rinse and repeating, she continued to scorch my hair with two blow dry sessions and a hot iron finish. I hear her rub the sizzled ends of my coarse hair between her fingers while looking at hers in disbelief, “Well at least it smells better?”
The little bell dings four times and my pasta is ready. I scrape my plate of condiments into the plastic dish and mix it together. I tuck in at the kitchen table, my feet up off the floor in a cross-legged position. My mom is there now, smelling of sunscreen and sweet iced wine. I push my hair behind my shoulders to take my first bite, and she hugs me and tousles it forward. She’s put her bathing suit coverup on at least, a mesh neon net barely covering her chest. “Your hair looks so pretty today, munchkin,” she says as she turns to refill the ice in her patio cup. The clack of ice against the dishwasher cracked plastic makes me shiver all over. I push away the bowl of pasta and leave the kitchen proclaiming I have homework to do. “That’s my smart cookie girl,” I hear her trail off as she goes back to her suntanning. I consider following her out there to tell her about my day, but she’s already peeling her shoulder straps off, and I realize there’s nothing that important to say.
