Where do old people go to get their hair cut?  Not moderately old people…the old people with one foot in the grave and one foot on a skate board…where do they go?  You’ve seen them, the women look like well dressed Q-tips and the men have those long, wispy necklines and three hairs that are combed over on the top.  How do you even go about ordering that hairstyle?  I would like the fluffy helmet and my husband wants the Benjamin Franklin.

I really don’t understand the comb over.  Who do the think they are kidding?  Everyone can see your glistening pate beneath those three hairs.  No one thinks that’s a full head of hair.  Once, several years ago, my father-in-law asked me to cut his (Benjamin Franklin) hair.  I was really excited, because I was going to bring him into the twenty-first century.  I trimmed the sides and mowed the fringe and cut the comb over and he looked amazing.  He had a fit!  “I like to look like I’ve got some hair!” To which I replied “well, you don’t so get over it.”  He never asked me to cut his hair again.  However; a couple of months after I had cut his hair, his regular barber got sick and he had to use a female barber.  She cut his hair exactly the same way I did.  He hated it.  I loved it!  I told him he had two women tell him that they felt that was the way his hair should look, maybe he should take notice.  He didn’t.  Ben Franklin is alive and well in Springfield, Missouri.

My grandmother was the queen of the Q-tip hairdo.  She had absolutely snow white hair.  Every Saturday night she would curl her hair on tiny little pink sponge rollers.  Then on Sunday morning should would back comb that two inch long hair until it formed a perfect little white helmet.  Then she sprayed…I mean shellacked…the hell out of it.   This would usually last till about Friday, but she was always good for church.  She would walk in and sit with her friends, and it looked like those two pews were filled with little white Q-tips.  The best was when the Q-tips would rise to sing a hymn.  All those little heads bobbing around with the piano music was a sight to behold.  No one had any doubt When The Roll Was Called Up Yonder  they would indeed be there.

I’m not sure we baby boomers, generation X’ers, Y’ers, and whatever’ers will continue with the Q-tip and Benny traditions.  I for one have a hard time seeing my self in the white helmet.  I know my mother’s stainless steel Jane Hathaway is not for me either but I think my generation will set our own style.  The 70’s really was a kinda nothing decade.  Maybe we will make up for it in the way we age.  We will be the oldies that age with great panache.  We will have kick ass wide leg jeans with low heeled boots, tunic tops (no belly shirts), and spikey little haircuts that are gelled to the moon and back.  We will wear our makeup boldly.  We will paint our canes, and put the best little decals we can find on our Rascals.  We will use designer drugs!  Or at least carry designer handbags.  Our walkers will have bright paint and streamers and bumper stickers and all kinds of fun things.  Just because you can’t walk doesn’t mean you shouldn’t party.  We will still go down, but we will go down fighting.  With good hair.

To those men currently over the age of 70 here is my advice: don’t go to barbers.  They will listen to you and you don’t know shit about hair.  If you did you wouldn’t all have the same hair.  Look at women.  They don’t all have the same hair.  There is no need.  Hair has different textures, colors, and thicknesses.  What works for one does not necessarily work for all.  It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.  So, if you see a barber’s pole…run!  In addition, a $7 haircut is not a good deal.  It looks like a $7 haircut.  You should have more self-respect.  Go all out.  Get a $20 haircut!  You might be surprised at how good you can look.  To all the over 70 women out there.  If your hairstylist is as old as you are she probably hasn’t been to a trade show in a few years.  Trade shows are the things that keep your stylist up to date  on what styles are currently fashionable.  When stylists go to these they get little certificates that look like diplomas and they put them on their walls (usually framed).  It means I care enough about hair to keep learning even after I have received my license.  These people are the people to go to if you are interested in looking younger than your years.  Just tell them to not let you walk outside looking like a Q-tip.  Most of them will tell you they would rather die.

My hairstylist has been my friend for 14 years.  My standing order is this: show as little gray as possible without using truck stop black dye and never let me look like a Q-tip.  This contract has been signed and she understands that if she fails to fulfill her end of this agreement I am allowed to teach her children any words and or phrases that I choose.  She has heard many of my words and phrases.  I’m pretty sure I’m gonna stay hooked up for life.

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