Trying Too Hard

   I try too hard.  Anything I do, should be done the best that I can.  My biggest, most important responsibilities include mothering and teaching.  Those endeavors naturally always receive a great deal of exertion.

   But the silliest waste of my efforts occur each morning, as I try too hard to fix my hair.  I’m a no-frills, no-make-up-except-lipstick kind of girl.  My beauty regimen (such a militaristic term) is limited.  I shower, shampoo, and condition my hair each night.  It’s part of my multi-tasking.  My hair can dry while I sleep.  

   Each morning, I dress, and brush my slightly-above-shoulder-length brown hair.  Then comes the decision.  Part in the middle?  Part to the left?  Part to the right?  Which hair clip will keep my hair out of my eyes?  Sometimes my “parting” decision is made for me.  Sometimes I wake up with my hair already doing its own thing, already parted on the left.  Easy.  Problem solved.  Except then I try to secure my hair with clips and the clip on one side is higher than the clip on the other.  Sometimes, my hair poofs up after a clip is fastened.  Then I accept defeat and know that my hair won’t be contained by a barrette.  It’s time for me to try a different tactic.

   My best ponytails are the ones I do sans mirror or brush.  The ponytails of necessity, as I’m busy around the house, about to cook and want to keep my hair out of my dinner.  Without much effort, my ponytail is done, and done well.  I try to make a ponytail in the morning, using my brush, looking in the mirror, and suddenly my ponytail is uneven.  One side of my hair looks decidedly higher than the other.  I’ve inadvertently created a mini-mohawk.  I need to get out of the house, want my hair up and out of my face, and I simply cannot do it.  Or do it as well as I’d like.  I take my ponytail down, try again.  I’ve now got what can only be described as a wanna-be-cornrow on the top of my head.  

   I see styles on women in movies and television shows, try to re-create the looks, and can’t.  Hairstyles that look relatively easy to duplicate, and yet try as I might, I can’t do it.  I see co-workers (women I know who don’t have the advantage of professional hairstylists creating their look) with their hair up or brushed back.  And try as I might, I can’t do those either.

   Looking through pictures of myself through the years, my hair doesn’t vary all that much.  Sometimes my Hershey-bar colored hair was a little above my shoulder, sometimes a little below, sometimes hanging down to my waist.  I look at those pictures and realize my hairstyle is just an added detail.  Nothing important.  And it still isn’t now.  

   I’ll remind myself of that tomorrow morning when I’m trying to do my hair.