Note: Longer post.
Be Careful What You Wish For
This maxim has taken on new meaning for me of late.
I love finding fun ways to use my last name in writing…
It all started with my hair.
Note: I had a very interesting upbringing filled with some very interesting characters including more than one whose perspective and values were questionable. These people and experiences shaped the events of my life giving me perspective. I know where I came from and how it shaped me. If it’s crazy or outrageous I generally – at this point – just roll my eyes. I’m sharing what I believe helpful – in this case – for manifesting.
Like many of my Celtic relatives and ancestors, I’m a towhead. In my case, not only was my hair very blonde as a child, it was poker straight as it hung down to my waist.
At least it did til the brain surgery when half was shaved off and my dad cut the other half so it would grow in symmetrically.
Around the age of 7 a couple of relatives decided I should perm my hair.
Because, they said, it would make me prettier.
My mom and dad weren’t thrilled with the idea but these relatives cajoled
One of them threatened
Until they gave in.
Pick and choose your battles was a maxim my father preached even if it fell under the “do as I say not as I do” maxim.
I well remember sitting in the kitchen of one of the relatives and being submitted to the most noxious chemical odors of a home perm in the name of making me prettier. I’ll admit I did like the perm and the curls.
Until I went to school and was brutally roasted by the other kids for them.
Eventually the perm grew out and I managed to avoid any more until deciding on my own at 13 I wanted one.
The years went by and though I generally styled my hair with the times
Good ol’ 80s mullets
I didn’t think much about perms and curly hair.
Unlike my goofy relative who continued to tell me I would be much prettier if only I had curly hair.**
Your Wish is My Command.
Then a curious thing happened.
I was working in tech and straight hair a la Michelle Pfeiffer in Tequila Sunrise was all the rage. I, however, wasn’t sold. More often than not I just pulled my hair up.
Hauling round VJ290s and MicroVAXes and crawling around in data centers laying cable and troubleshooting isn’t conducive to much in the way of fancy hair styles.
A Consultant’s Work is Never Done.
It was the Golden Age of Tech and I was living on planes.
Flying out Sunday or Monday, back Friday or Saturday, then out again Sunday or Monday – for months straight.
Wouldn’t It Be Cool…?
Famous last words.
I loved the movie Tequila Sunrise for a number of reasons, including that it was set in So Cal, a place I loved. I admired Michelle Pfieffer but didn’t envy her hair. In point of fact, I thought it really would be cool if I had hair that was curly.
It ran in the family so I knew I could have had it.
Next thing I know I’m living in California.
Job transfer.
You’re Kidding.
Foot Locker thickens the plot.
Needing new tennis shoes I headed to Foothills Mall where I stopped at Foot Locker.
Don’t think it’s there anymore.
As I was checking out, the woman helping me slipped a sample of Pantene shampoo and conditioner into the box.
When I pointed out it was for curly hair I didn’t have she shrugged and said, “So? It’s free.”
Um, Aaron?
You aren’t going to believe this…
After towel drying my hair I looked in the mirror to see…
???
Curly hair!
I phoned Aaron and told him the deal.
I couldn’t believe it!
Could shampoo really make someone’s hair curly?
Something in the Water.
Without going into it, since I already have in a number of books on various aspects, the mineral content in the water released my naturally curly hair.
Whereas calcium in the water in Michigan kept them straight.
What You Wish For.
The water may have unlocked the curl in my hair but it was also contaminated with heavy metals that wreaked havoc with my health and while I’ve addressed that issue I’ve been left with a glaring truth:
When you manifest you have to be prepared for what goes with it.
The positive is I now consider – as fully as I can – what may be involved if I get what I say I want.
I examine, to the best of my ability, the trade-offs.
To a degree we can never know what it’s like until we’ve been there but I believe I’m wiser now about what I aspire to.
I hope by sharing this story others can benefit.
Be well.
** When my hair darkened in my towheaded adolescence this relative kept trying to get me to dye it blonde because – apparently – I was no longer pretty.
Some people and their oddball values.
Elizabeth Maxim 