April 11, 2007
Wednesday

Like a lot of women of my generation, I grew up dissatisfied with my appearance. I have a broad, square face, the gift of my Russian peasant forebears on my father’s side, and pale, paper-thin skin from my maternal Irish line that burns and freckles and wouldn’t tan to a sunny glow even if I hadn’t spent most of my youth in some library alcove with my nose in a book. As I entered adolescence, my mother made me wear contact lenses in an effort to mitigate my “doppy” look, a plainness which was evidently exacerbated by glasses. I didn’t look like Annette Funicello or Sally Field or the girls who danced on Bandstand, and I thought of myself the way Emily Dickinson described herself: “a kangaroo among the beauties.”

So I’m not pretty, but it has been my privilege in life to acquire friends who base their relationships more on what a person’s spirit and soul can offer than on what she looks like. Once, during a spring dieting frenzy when our lunch table looked like the organic produce section of a supermarket, a companion (herself overweight and overwhelmed) pointed out that I had a happy marriage, a perfect daughter, a job I loved, and a terrific life. “Is there a reason you have to look any different?” she asked. And I couldn’t think of one.

So I don’t sigh over my appearance. If there are people out there who are waiting for me to lose weight or get better looking before they’ll want to spend time with me, well, I’m really not interested. Except . . .

Except I hate my hair.

It’s thin, fine, and totally without personality. There doesn’t seem to be enough of it to cover the shape of my head, so I think I look like I’m wearing a hat that’s too small. The color, despite being installed by a professional colorist in a time-consuming, expensive salon procedure, looks artificial. And I have absolutely no talent when it comes to styling it. I can’t wield a curling iron or blow dryer with any dexterity (unlike Lynn, who must have gotten this along with the science and math gene from her paternal DNA). In this regard, the sixties were good to me, allowing me to let my hair hang in a long, blunt-cut auburn fall that needed nothing but shampoo and a shakeout.

If I could change one thing about my appearance, it wouldn’t be the chubby thighs or the thick waist, it wouldn’t be the crows’ feet at my eyes or the square jaw. It would be the hair. I would have perfect hair.

About ten days ago I went down to Millersville University to do some research at their archives and special collections and have lunch with Lynn. Later in the afternoon, indulging a resurrected interest in knitting, I visited Kitnit Fine Yarns, a shop I’d patronized more than thirty years ago, when I was deep in my handcrafts period.

Kitnit is a typical specialty yarn shop. The wares are stacked on shelves in tall cases against the walls and in undercounter bins in the middle of the room, giving the place the look of a library of fibers instead of books. As soon as you enter, the colors pull your eye and feed your imagination, and you could have as pleasant an experience there as visiting a museum even if you didn’t want to buy anything.

But I did. I was paging through my notebook when someone said to me, “Can I help you?” “Yes,” I said. “I want to make a . . . ” And as I raised my head to look at the woman who was speaking to me, my eyes widened, and instead of completing my sentence, I said, “You have the most gorgeous hair.”

Betsie Lesher, the proprietor of Kitnit, is a petite woman who has only recently taken over ownership of the shop. She has a ready smile and a helpful manner, and she was as generous with her information about her hair as she was with suggestions for ways I could implement my desires as a knitter. She said she gets a lot of compliments on her hair. She let me touch it. It’s as fine and thin as mine. The secret, she said, is in the cut and the goo and the way her stylist taught her to use it. “Call Snippers in Rohrerstown, ask for Chris Skiles, and say ‘I want Betsie Lesher’s hair,'” she told me.

I left Kitnit with a ball of variegated Wyoming earth-toned wool yarn shot through with aloe vera and jojoba oil to make socks I can wear out west in November, and the phone number of Snippers. I called the next day. And yesterday I went there, forty miles, and I am delighted to say that I did indeed get the look I wanted, got to pet an affectionate black Lab mix dog the proprietor had rescued from a bad situation, and talk to her about the problem of puppy mills in Lancaster county.

I felt and looked terrific (or felt I looked terrific, which might be the same thing) when I left. I made an appointment for a month from now for another cut and corrective color. I went back to Kitnit to show off my hair and get more yarn for another project. When I got home, Ron agreed that the hair looked interesting, but wondered (given my general klutziness with the art) what it might look like when I washed it and then had to fix it myself.

It looks just fine. For a comparison, check the state of the hair just one month ago. That’s not what sixty looks like anymore. This is!