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44 Hair Care | Becoming a Curly Girl

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As a child I had pretty ringlets in my hair. They were never tight, frizzy curls and I don’t remember Mom having to do much to them to get them into ringlets. Over time, though, my hair must have grown out of them–blame puberty, blame products, who knows? All I know is that by my teen years my hair seemed to have a mind of it’s own, one diametrically opposed to what I wanted it to do!

So of course it seemed like a good idea to ask for a perm for my 13th birthday. I went in wanting a “large curl perm” and came out with the one thing I expressly did not want: a poodle perm. (I don’t seem to have any pictures readily available from this period–I wonder why…)

The woman at the salon swore she understood what I wanted and mentioned, mid-way through, that my hair was so thick (it never had been before) that it was going to take 2 bottles of solution for her to finish. A year later I had to chop off the bottom half of my hair because the damned curls never relaxed or fell out the way they did on most girls.

So I was pretty resigned, after that, to having whatever hair. Hair that only seemed to behave on the day I was planning to have it cut (seriously, it’s some sort of psychological hair warfare). And mostly pulling it back with a barrette to weight it down or, later, twisting it up in a clip. Those worked to tame a wonton wave or two but did nothing for the frizz. So I followed the accepted wisdom that products–namely those with silicone–would act as a barrier between my hair and the North Florida humidity responsible for the demonic halo encircling my head on the daily.

And, in true Schadenfreude style, trying to curl my hair be it in hot rollers, pin curls, curling irons, etc. yielded a decided lack thereof–nothing would stick for longer than it took for me to walk out of the house. Case in point: for our engagement photos this January I pin-curled my hair the night before and came out with this:

clowning around, just like my hair | photo by Pink Shutterbug Photography

clowning around, just like my hair | photo by Pink Shutterbug Photography

I’d heard about the Curly Girl method in the past, but I had stopped believing my hair was capable of curl anymore, so let the info sail on back to the rear filing cabinet of my brain. Until, of course, it appeared on another blog I follow a few months ago. And with the wedding so much on my mind these days I figured, hey, why not give it a chance.

Curly Girl by Lorraine Massey | Image via NaturallyCurly.com

So off I went to track down sulfate and silicone free hair products that (very important!) wouldn’t break the bank but would nourish my hair and give it free rein to curl at will.

And I’ll be damned if it didn’t work.

At Ancient City Con & minimal hair prep (before I chopped off about 3") | photo by Todd

At Ancient City Con & minimal hair prep (before I chopped off about 3″) | photo by Todd

First I tried co-washing with a Suave Naturals Coconut Conditioner. Yes, apparently there are enough surfactants (big word for cleaners) in most conditioners to do the job without stripping curly hair of it’s much-needed oils. This worked (when paired with a leave-in treatment and certain safe styling products) but it took a lot more time in the mornings, something I didn’t have heaps of to begin with.

So when the folks at Naturally Curly announced that they’d paired up with Loreal to create an EverCurl line of products that met all the requirements of curly girls out there, I was super-excited. It gave me my 2-step hair prep back and their leave-in conditioning cream worked pretty well, too. One day, feeling a bit flush as I was under budget for the month, even after putting in some extra into the wedding savings, I let myself pick up some ridiculously expensive leave-in cream from Earth Fare. I’m just happy that it’s a few months later and that $10 bottle of leave-in is still about half full. I still haven’t gotten the hang of the refresh spray I also picked up, but I’m trying. Second-day hair is still kinda tricky.

And instead of spending hours in pin curls or hot rollers? All it takes is “plopping” it up in a microfiber towel (picked up in the automotive department) while I put on my makeup and I’ve got all-day curls (2-day curls if I’m lucky).

Embracing my curls was a really cool experience and has even affected my mood overall. I know it sounds silly, on par with the joke about people losing IQ points when they dye their hair blonde (something I do not agree with, btw), but bouncier hair meant a bouncier me!

Have you ever maid a hair-brained decision that affected more than your head?

44 Self Care | Frankie Says: Reflex!

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Or, hey, better yet, reflects…

Reflexology falls under the heading of alternative medicine and focuses on pressure points (usually on the hands and feet but ears are used, too) to affect other, believed-to-be-connected systems. And while there are plenty of charts available that show the points in question and while I’m not convinced it works I’m also not convinced it doesn’t, I wouldn’t want to speak on something so involved with only a few Internet searches to back me up.

Instead, lets reflect on our reflexes in general for a minute.

When we go to the doctor for a physical, the doctor tests our reflexes by tapping a trigger point and looking for an expected response. A tap at the base of our knee is supposed to make our foot kick out (if everything is working properly), the same for our elbow and forearm. If you’ve ever seen any sort of counselor or therapist, your emotional reflexes have been evaluated in similar ways. We are told about or shown a picture of something sad, we are expected to respond in kind, happy for happy, good for pride, evil for anger.

But what happens when our reflexes are triggered by unexpected stimuli? What if something that is otherwise benign to others affects us in a way that is atypical. This happens everyday with little, private in-jokes that make us laugh when everyone else remains unamused or we attach ourselves to sentimental objects that make us happy or even a little sad if the object reminds us of a missing loved one. These are generally accepted, if atypical, responses or reflexes.

Just as we can associate laughter and joy with random people, places, or things, others can trigger negative responses. What might be mildly irritating to one person, if they even notice it, could send you into a rage. Or what is generally considered unfortunate by one person might send me into a pit of despair. We often don’t ask for these reflexive reactions, but they are ours just the same.

What can we do about them?

If a doctor notices a child has delayed reflexes, physical therapies may be available to get him where he needs to be eventually. If a counselor notices a lack of standard emotional responses in someone else, behavioral therapies can be applied. But maybe your reflexes aren’t to that level. Maybe you just want a better handle on them for your own reasons, but they don’t necessarily require the help of a doctor or therapist.

Here’s an example:

When I was a little girl I went through some bad stuff at home. Not being grounded unfairly level of bad stuff, we’re talking authorities getting involved: case workers, counselors, lawyers and courts kind of bad stuff. And it took me many years to fully grasp the enormity of it all and then many, many more to be able to process it and get past it to the point where it no longer has a permanent spot in the corner of my mind.

But I have some triggers that bring me back to that time, that pull the memories and feelings out of the filing cabinet of my younger years and shove them into the present. One is a particular song that was released around the time the shit hit the fan and happens to be kind of creepy in its own right to begin with. When I hear this song my muscles clench, my mood is altered, and I just want to get away from it as fast as possible.

The normal reaction to a song we don’t care for is to change the radio station with a shrug or maybe an eye-roll. Me? I’m all-but paralyzed by it. When I woke up one morning to that song playing on the clock radio by my bed? Yeah, that wasn’t a fun day at all. The song is the little rubber mallet, my emotions are the knee-jerk reaction.

What can I do about it?

I’m a big proponent of the Power of Why. When we know why something triggers a reaction in us, we can work with it and within ourselves to temper and adjust that reaction. It’s been nearly 30 years and that song still bugs me (understatement of the year) but it’s not merely that I don’t like the song, it’s what the song represents to me, a period of time that altered my life considerably. So I have to deal with the ideas behind the trigger and in large part I have, but there are some things that you just don’t forget. And if you can’t forget them, they can still affect you.

The thing to see here, though, is that I know that song is a trigger for me. Not everyone can really pinpoint their triggers and the connections behind them. Someone might just know they dislike a certain habit or place, but until they really sit down and unpack the why behind it–sometimes help is needed for this step–they’ll never stand a chance of improving their reflexes to it.

So this isn’t the same type of prompt I’ve offered for the last couple of arts, but I think it still falls under the heading of self-care that this current art is focusing on. What I would urge you to do is take one of those reflexes you have that maybe you’ve never looked closely at, and examine it. Really peer into the corners and pull up the rug and try to figure out the why behind it. Journal about it, talk to someone if you think it might help, talk out loud to yourself even because hearing these sorts of things out loud can have a profound effect and help us make connections in ways that internalizing the conversation cannot. Hold on to the good ones and see if there’s a way you can distance yourself from the not-so-good.

Going around being ruled by our emotional reflexes takes time and energy away from what little we have allotted. While I don’t think we need to be 100% in control and predictable all the time–where’s the adventure in that?–I do think it’s important not to fight for those truly scarce personal resources so that we can use them the way we want to, not the way our reflexes command us to.

I hope you got something out of that.

~Scraps

44 Massage | The Laying On of Hands

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Our next art is focusing on various forms of self-care–something many of us do not do enough of, much to our body and soul’s detriment.

44 Massage and care of the body and hair

Vigorous massage using the feet or hands, delicately on the hair giving it an aesthetic set.

I have tendinitis in both my thumbs. This kinda gets in the way when I’m working on a project, writing, or typing. Hell, it gets in the way of sleeping if the flare-up gets bad enough, and some nights it has. While it may sound counter-intuitive to poke an aching area, my first inclination has always been to make a sort of fist with the hand that hurts, using the last 3 fingers to apply pressure to the padded bit below my thumb, where the pain concentrates. And it helps.

jwalker_sol_squeezing_into_the_pain

It’s the same way when we bump into something we grab at or rub the affected area. Part of that is, I’d imagine, is to check the level of damage done–is there a knot? is there blood? how bad does it hurt?–but it also serves the purpose of soothing, both physically and emotionally. Emotionally? Yes–haven’t you ever rubbed a friends back when they’re upset as a way of saying ‘I know it hurts, but I’m here for you’ when words maybe weren’t possible or felt inadequate? I know I have.

And this (again, this is me theorizing on the topic, so don’t take it as gospel) is where I think the practice of massage comes from. Our bodies know instinctively what to do in so many situations, and one day someone must have noticed and it became a thing and a practice instead of just a reflex. And then as we learned more about physiology and the way the nerves run through our bodies, it made more and more sense to press area A to relieve tension in quadrant 3.

Or something like that.

These days massage therapy is done by licensed professionals and, in a lot of cases, should be left up to them. Along with knowing how we can help by apply pressure in just the right spot in just the right way, came the knowledge of how pressure applied the wrong way, at the wrong angle, or to the wrong spot could cause more pain or severe damage to affected systems.

Vulcan Neck Pinch anyone?

That doesn’t mean we can’t at least try to assuage our own issues (be it tension or pain) as long as we keep one main thing in mind:

If it hurts: Stop!

And only the person in pain can determine the difference between ouch-pain and ooh-that-hurts-but-it’s-helping-pain, so make sure you’re listening if you’re lending a hand to a friend.

Since I’m not a licensed massage therapist, I don’t want to give out any information that could be misleading or cause injury, but I think the following tips are safe enough to share:

  1. Start with gentle pressure and move to firmer pressure if you feel the spot warrants it. Don’t start with deep-tissue massage techniques until you’ve tried a gentler method first so as not to aggravate an already painful area.
  2. Don’t depend only on your thumbs. A friend of mine did go through massage therapy school and shared that the biggest occupational hazard seemed to be damage to the masseurs thumbs from all the pressure put on them. So use your whole hand, the palm of your hand, or a handheld massage tool if you like to keep from causing injury to your hands.
  3. Keep track of your breathing and mood. If you’ve every gone in for a massage treatment, the lights are usually soft, the music or ambient noise is low–it’s all to get you to relax. Massage works on muscle tension, and it’s going to be super-tough to work out a knot if the rest of you isn’t cooperating. Take some deep breaths and concentrate on positive thoughts while you massage.
  4. Short sessions spread out over the course of a day may be more helpful than one longer, more intense session. Just like in exercise where the muscles get used and then are allowed a resting period to relax and repair, massage spread out over time may have more lasting effects than a single session. When you’re working a single spot–like a sore shoulder or a charlie horse in your leg, try for just 30 seconds and then wait a while.
  5. If your skin is dry or sensitive, adding lotions or oils could prevent irritation. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy–just your usually moisturizer or body lotion will do–or you could go the essential oil route (just make sure your using diluted oils–never apply essential oils directly to the skin as their concentrations can cause unpleasant skin reactions). For a sports injury or other irk with an obvious cause, using a product like Ben-Gay or IcyHot could, of course, also work to help ease that sort of inflammation of tissues.

Ultimately the directive is simple: take care of your body and it will take care of you. We ask a lot of ourselves throughout the days, weeks, months, and years, it’s only fair that we give something back to it.

And what does this have to do with living creatively? Physical pain is not generally considered a creative motivator and takes our focus away from what we’d like to be doing. Taking care of ourselves makes sure we’re able to act on those creative urges when the muse calls.

42 & 43 Animals | Are you Flying with Eagles or In the Doghouse?

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Days I get to be creative always rank higher in my memory than those where I was too busy, too tired, or pulled in too many directions to get much of anything done. Just too much too! But even on those days where I don’t get to engage in any High Creative pursuits (the obvious things like writing, drawing, crafting, creative moment, etc.–those I consider “high creativity” just to be able to differentiate), sometimes I forget that creativity can be found in little things, in fleeting moments of time. Even writing down an idea I’ll work more on another day or making dinner are creative actions. Hey, some days, just creating CO2 from breathing is enough if it’s all you can claim!

While I’d never go so far as to call any creativity “low” (I’d say Low Creative would be the equivalent of bump on a log-ness, or being too sick to even focus on bad television shows), I do believe in the Everyday Creativity that we sometimes take for granted when we’re being a bit self-critical. Did you put together a cute outfit or make some sort of effort with your appearance? Creativity. Did you make some substitutions in the recipe you were using for supper? Creativity. Did you scribble on a pad in a meeting or start making patterns in the margins of your notes in a meeting? Creativity. Did you play a round of Candy Crush on your phone? Yes, that counts as creativity, too, the Everyday sort.

So while recognizing and appreciating the Everyday Creative things we do is important, I think scheduling in some High Creative time each week (if not each day) can keep up soaring on a creative high versus feeling like we’re in the doghouse of our own life.

Inspired by thoughts of avian and animal friends, here are some creative prompts to get you into some High Creative time over the next couple of weeks.

Assign Yourself an Old-Fashioned Book Report

I don’t know what this has to do animals per se, though you could certainly pick a book with animals as the main character. (Goodreads has a great list over here if you feel suddenly stumped on the subject.) You can challenge yourself to read it and write up the usual grade-school summary, find a book club study guide or set of questions to get you thinking about the themes of the book, or do what I did in high school called a tracking project where you take one character or theme and follow or track them/it throughout the book and kind of figure out what all their different bits mean when put together. It’s just another way to actively read a book, but I’m all for just picking up an old favorite, too, and curling up with someone else’s world.

In fact, that’s probably why this occurred to me, now, because it’s all grey and rainy outside and I’d love nothing more than to curl up with a cup of tea and the book I downloaded on my Kindle last night and spend the evening reading.

Create a Scrapbook Page (or Mini-Album) About Your Current (or Childhood) Pet

Maybe you had a special pet that’s since passed away, maybe you have a current pet that you want to immortalize in photos or paint or paper or words. Just do something creative around that companions  and think about something that makes them special to you or something that they do that always makes you laugh. It doesn’t have to be a stellar work of Art or anything, just heartfelt.

Volunteer at Your Local Animal Shelter

This might not sound uber-creative at first, but sometimes just getting out of our normal routine and doing something helpful can be a good spirit-lifter and I’ve found that a lifted spirit is one that is more open to ideas and new pursuits. If you would like to do something on more of a High Creative level with animal well-being in mind, how about making some blankets or toys for the animals in the shelter? Or maybe the shelter needs someone to take photos of the new arrivals so they can be put up on the website, or someone to write up creative posts for PetFinder to help get them adopted. Just ask how you can help.

Head to the nearest Park, Zoo, or Nature Preserve and Observe

Rather than go exhibit to exhibit, pick just a couple of your favorites and sit and watch a while. Make up a story about the animals or imagine what they might be saying to one another. If you don’t have any place like this around or that you can reasonably get to for whatever reason a) I’m so sorry. b) Check out any number of places that have Critter Cams and live vicariously through your computer.

Consider Your Spirit or Totem Animal

This might be a little out-there for some of you, but go with me for a minute. Lots of cultures place a high importance on the kinship of animals and people on a spiritual level. You can look at spirit or totem animals as embodiments of you or your personality or as spiritual protectors. There are lots of lists out there like this one at What’s Your Sign that seems pretty comprehensive. I’ve read before that most kids have the bear as their spirit animal as kids–the way the teddy bear becomes that common point of comfort for so many–but as we grow and our personality and lives develop new animals come in to play a part.

For the record, I identify with both monkey (of course!) and spider (surprisingly, but it also rings true), once  my extended bear phase waned. But there’s still room in the  menagerie as new facets are needed.

42 & 43 Animals | Our Furry, Feathered, and Finned Friends

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And all the others that might be left out by those 3 Fs!

I’m going to go ahead and combine the next two Arts for reasons of time and, well, modernity.

42 Stockbreeding

Raising and training rams, cocks, fighting partridges, and organizing battles, as for an army.

43 Teaching parrots and mynah birds to talk

As most sorts of organized animal fighting are illegal–not to mention morally questionable–in this country, I’m not going down the road of building an animal army. But there is something to be said (a lot of somethings, perhaps) on the subject of caring for our animal companions and even the concept of humane treatment of those animals which are grown for food.

And sometimes the line gets blurred.

My ex-husband’s family lived out in the country with a fair amount of land. Each year they would purchase a cow to raise and then have it slaughtered locally to fill their freezer. One year my ex’s little brother got attached to that year’s cow, named it and everything, and you can imagine the tough times that caused at dinner for a while.

Unfortunately, their idea of steak was plate-sized and paper thin (okay, something like 1/2 inch or just under) and the only way they cooked it was well-done. Now that, my friends, is one cow that died in vain.

With homesteading and other self-sufficiency ideals returning, rabbits and chickens are more commonly kept for meat and eggs, respectively, as they take up much less space than, say, cows or hogs might, and require less grazing room than even a goat or two, so better suited to urban or suburban set-ups. And if aquaculture is more your thing, I remember seeing in an episode of Doomsday Preppers where one family had turned their in-ground pool into a greenhouse and small lake and bred tilapia–they apparently multiply quicker than rabbits!

On the other side of the coin, of course, are pets.

Our home is currently sans members of the 4-legged variety, though I know Todd would really like to have a dog again if (when!) his schedule permits. I’m all for it, too–I may have had to re-home my rat terrier, Abigail, several years ago when my health and travel schedule did not permit me to spend as much time with her as she deserved, but I think a home with more people than pets is a good ratio for success when I’m one of the people involved. Being able to tag-team pet parenting is vital for me.

A few months ago I even reviewed a cookbook for dogs, if you’ve ever thought of decreasing or even eliminating the kibble and processed dog foods from your canine’s diet.

Lots of our friends are cat people and, as much as I appreciate their self-sufficiency in many ways, the slight allergy I developed to them after not having one around (grew up with cats when I lived at home with Mom) prevents me from considering them as an option (even if I was willing to have a litter box in the house, which I’m really not keen on).

Fish never did much for me–maybe it was all those carnival-won goldfish that didn’t live very long that soured me on them–but I know many people take great pride in their aquariums and find them very comforting. And while the same could be said for rodents and snakes, I think I’ll pass on those, too.

Making a friend in Roatan

Making a friend in Roatan while on a cruise excursion (2009)–sure, he was more interested in eating my headband than smiling for the picture, but what can you do?!

Now, birds on the other hand, they are really amazing. Sure, they can be messy pets–throwing seeds about and all that–but I can see where the attraction lies. Coincidental to the art at hand, I’ve had a few encounters with the talking varieties and they really are something else.

My high school Latin teacher, Mrs. Walper, had a parrot named Bogey. (He was an African Grey, I think, I can’t be absolutely certain but the pictures I’ve found look like what I remember.) Anyway, Bogey was quite the prankster as my teacher also had an elderly Schnauzer named Sheba and Bogey would call Sheba’s name and confuse that poor dog like you would believe! He also liked to sing ‘Popeye the Sailor Man’ as I recall. Bogey had a large cage with lots of rungs to play on in Mrs. W’s office and also had a perch in the Florida room where we’d get to visit with him during some of our Sunday study sessions leading up to state competition. (If you hadn’t yet figured out I was more than a bit of a nerd in school, that should tip you off!) Bogey also got sent to “jail” when he was especially naughty (jail being the guest room shower stall–it was not a tough life he led).

Later on I learned that parrots, in general, often out-live their first owners and a reputable breeder can and often does insist upon knowing who will care for the feathered one after it’s companion’s demise! This is smart since they can live 70 to 100+ years when properly cared for. It’s tough enough, sometimes, for cats and dogs to find good homes when their human has passed away, I would imagine the care of a parrot would be a lot to take on for many!

Still, it’s an important consideration–not just for parrots. Being responsible for any creature–human or otherwise–is a big commitment! And unlike children who (for the most part) grow up and can eventually take care of themselves, our pets will always depend on us for their well-being. In fact, when I see pan-handlers on the street with dogs tethered to them, I usually feel more sorry for the animals than the people–they had even less choice in their situation than their humans, that’s for sure!

What are your feelings on pets? Are they a part of your livelihood, companions, or not part of it at all?