Oh What a Tangled Web

Linda said it was all my fault.  But it wasn't.

I mean, it's really not my job to remind her to bring a towel to the gym. And I did, in fact, come up with a scathingly brilliant Plan B: using her sweat pants to dry off after her shower. 

The problem was that she didn't want to use sweat pants to dry her hair.  So I suggested she use the B52-turbo powered hand dryer.  "Stick your head under this", I said, pointing to the most powerful hand dryer I have ever used.

“Hold on to your head, though, or it will end up in the men’s locker room.”

I guess Linda stuck her head a wee bit too close to the hand dryer.   She ended up with a B52-turbo sized dreadlock.

And it would not comb out.

It reminded me of Kimmy, during her "cave girl" phase.  She was around 5 years old and had incredibly naughty, knotty hair which she refused to let me comb.  She insisted on combing her own hair every morning...or at least the top layer of it.  

I know.  What kind of Mom would let her daughter go to school looking like Cave Girl? 

Me.

Kimmy would leave the house every day with a perfectly combed, wispy layer of hair which rested atop of a rat's nest that took on a life of its own.  Her hair seemed to grow, both in height and volume, by the day.  

It would inevitably reach the point where she would not be able to find even a wispy layer to hide the growing ball of tangle.  Only then I was able to get near her crown with a comb (resulting in trauma and drama).  I would spend upwards of an hour unraveling wads of intricately entangled dreadlocks while she screamed for mercy. 

In my defense, I’d be as gentle as possible.  And I tried to keep things light, “Oh, here’s that barrette you’ve been looking for…. And look!  I just found the math homework you said you lost!”  Kimmy saw no humor in these moments.  And I was not always successful.  Sometimes  I would have to cut out the dreadlock.

(Her kindergarten bald spot was barely noticeable by 2nd grade.)

Although Linda's dreadlock paled in comparison to those harvested by Cave Girl Kimmy,  it was, in itself, quite impressive.   This picture really does not do it justice. 

I started unraveling the tangle.  The problem was that Linda’s hair is quite long, and this dreadlock incorporated hairs from every square centimeter of her scalp.  I tugged.  I pulled.  I unraveled.  

Truth be told, it was actually kind of fun (for me), not unlike the 5-star Sunday Soduku.

Except, unlike the Sunday Soduku, this mission was impossible.

After about 5-minutes Linda was in a near frenzy, exacerbated by my locker room bellow of, “Does anyone have a pair of scissors?”

Someone from our Body Jam class had nail clippers which I used to removed the tangled tress.  Yes!!!

But Linda was not happy.   

"It could have been worse", I said, attempting to reassure her.  

 "At least I didn't need that chain saw I used to use on Kimmy."