Her Hair is Always a Mess*

I took Lana to the mall yesterday to buy some earrings. This Sunday will be six weeks since she had her ears pierced, which means she can change out of her starter earrings.

We found some very cute little roses and turtles that were marked, "sensitive solutions" and got in line to pay for them.

There was a woman standing near the check out counter, who moved to the side when we walked up, presumably to indicate that she was not actually in line.

She was Asian, and my first thought was that she looked A LOT like the woman who played Mrs. Kim on Girlmore Girls. My second thought was, "why is that woman touching Lana's hair?"

I was kind of embarrassed because Lana's hair was a mess, and in my head I was having all these horrible and complicated feelings that this woman was judging me for having an Asian daughter and having failed to keep her hair nicely brushed.

(Honestly, Lana has a LOT of hair, and by the end of the day, it is kind of a mess, and yes, her hair needs a trim, and no, we haven't actually managed to get to the salon in the last couple of weeks.)

Anyway, I was standing there feeling twelve kinds of awkward while this stranger touched my daughter's hair. So, I was surprised when she smiled at me broadly and said,

"Your daughter has beautiful hair. I remember when MY daughter had beautiful hair."

She said this second sentence quite loudly, and the woman in front of me in line turned around.

I realized the girl must be the woman's daughter - a teenage girl with a beautiful face, but who had obviously dyed her black hair an extremely unflattering shade of yellow.

The girl looked at me, she looked at Lana, and she hissed, "Mom, you are embarrassing me!"

At that point, all I could do was laugh. I was so relieved that the encounter was not about me, and not about my daughter's hair, and not about race or ethnicity, but instead a plain and simple universal truth - mothers and daughters will probably always disagree about hair!

LM
* Train, Meet Virginia