Thursday, August 26, 2010

Throwback Thursday - Volume "Do Your Hair Right"

Brush your hair.

Put some lipstick on.

My mother was an ever repeating chorus of these statements as I was growing up.  I went from not being allowed to shave my knees (5th grade) to in trouble for not looking appropriate and combing my hair (6th grade) overnight.  So the fact that my mother encouraged me to begin highlighting my hair around this time should have been about as surprising as the Speidi divorce.
My hair was darkening to a delightful shade of "mouse-y brown" and I flat out refused to chemically alter my hair with a "body wave" as my mother desired, seriously, WTF Mom?, So highlighting was a compromise.
Side Note - What IS a body wave?  A perm?  I had bangs at the time, do you think my bangs would have been *waved* as well?  Never mind, don't answer that.
But just like everything else in my family, laundry, dinner, clothes ironing, if you wanted something done, you did it yourself (unless you weren't old enough to see over the ironing board or something.) So one day while being forced into a family weekend at the river, we stopped at the grocery store in the booming metropolis of Uvalde, TX.  I had been diligently reading the latest copies of Seventeen and Cosmopolitan (don't tell my Mom I wasn't allowed to read that one yet... it talked about SEX) and decided Sun In was the way to go. 
You thought about it to.  Don't deny it.  I mean how could you not?
Of course I went with the Super strength Sun In. 


The bottle has changed, but the directions have not.  In case you can't see the above image directions are as follows:
1. Spray in damp hair and comb through to distribute
2. Something about a sun streaked look to only spray select strands
3. Let the sun dry your hair, or you can boost the process with the help of a hair dryer.
This instruction list is obviously abbreviated by my 29 year old mind.  My 12 year old mind read:
Damp hair, spray, comb, sun, blow dry, repeat.  Use entire bottle.
Did I forget to tell you I thought this shit washed out over time?  I had no idea this was permanent.

Anywho, I woke up the next morning and jumped in the shower to wet my hair.  I stood in the bathroom and sprayed 1/2 the bottle into my hair, combed it through, grabbed a beach towel, my walkman, and trusty Seventeen (pretty sure it was the one with Nikki and Chrissy Taylor, RIP Chrissy) and headed to lay by the river.  All freaking morning.
Then, because I had no idea whether the blonde in the bottle was working as my head was wet from a dip in the river, I went back to the house, sprayed the remainder of the bottle into my hair and then proceeded to blow fry the crap out of it.
It. Was. Blonde.
And I loved it.  For a few days.
Then one day, I am fairly certain it was the Sunday before the first day of middle school, also known as the first year of the most judgmental and awful years of your life, I woke up and staggered into the kitchen for breakfast.  My Mom took one look at me and teared up mumbling something about fixing this disaster as soon as possible while running from the room to find the phone.
I went to the bathroom and then I too started to cry.
Some horrible girl with orange hair was staring back at me, and she too was crying. 
I composed myself and walked into the room where my mother was just finishing her phone message to the lady who cuts my hair and I tried to assure her that I could spend the whole day in the shower washing and rewashing and surely it would come out by the end of the day.
That's when I learned Sun In is like a hair tattoo.  Permanent.  And it took like 3 professionally applied colorings to fix. 
And so began my journey with hair coloring.

Here is a link to the catchy Sun In commercial circa 1992 for your viewing pleasure.  I would embed the video but I don't really know how and my computer beeping at me really loudly and I expect it to self destruct any minute now.

Happy Thursday!

4 comments:

Sarah RDH said...

I used Sun-In too. And I wasn't allowed to have Seventeen when I was 13 either, so my neighbor would let me read hers on the bus. And YM. I was allowed to have that one though. And yes, I also used most of the bottle, and I sure as shit used to hair dryer to speed it up. I don't recall such a disaster, but again, I was 13, so I prolly thought I looked pretty hot. My mom wouldn't let me dye my hair for real. And if it says anything for how much my mother paid attention to me, when I was 14, my neighbors mother started highlighting my hair for me and my mom never even noticed. So she surely wouldn't notice a botched Sun-In job. (But she did finally buy me a "frosting" kit- you know, with the cap and all, that I'm fairly certain is for women trying to hide grays. Yeah I never used it.)

Becky Mochaface said...

You couldn't shave your knees? Why just the knees? I wasn't allowed to shave until 6th grade. And then I got that circle razor with only the one blade. Remember those? I was so damn excited to get that razor. Pretty sure I cut the hell out of my legs with that bad boy.

twononblondes said...

Sarah - I so had to help my Mom *frost* her hair! I imagine that would have been her next suggestion had I not gone Oompa Loompa on her.
Becky - I meant to say ABOVE the knees. She wouldn't let me shave above the knees, and no, there was no good reason for that either. And now that I think of it she was very hesitant to let me shave behind my knees... I don't understand that either. I think I need therapy!

Sarah RDH said...

I was scared shitless to shave behind my knees. I was convinced I was going to cut a major important vein and/or artery and die.

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