Love, Jimmie

Daddy-O’s birthday is today.  You know how I like to share stories about people on their birthdays. Of course I couldn’t let Daddy-O down! 

Once upon a time, Martie and I lived with Daddy-O and JiJi for a little while.  Daddy-O has spent most of his life around girls and all three of his sons turned out to be daughters and it should be noted that the years Martie and I lived with Daddy-O were the years right on the cusp of us becoming women.  Martie and I got hormones, then JiJi got preggo with The Squirt and then JiJi had The Squirt, so you can imagine the daily and volatile mood swings he suffered from.  For two years.  What a man. 

I lived with them in what I like to call my “experimental phase” and by that I mean, I discovered makeup and hair goo.  (Get your mind out of the gutters, pervs. This here post is about my Daddy-O.)  Daddy-O and JiJi let me experiment as much as I pleased which, you know, looking back doesn’t embarrass me at all and no one is allowed to visit them and look through those old photo albums. I would have rainbow eyelids one day and powdery blue shimmer from eyebrow to eyelash on another.  I was a big fan of neon-colored mascara and wearing Daddy’s too-big sweaters.  I loved every color of nail polish and chewed grape bubble gum all day, every day.  It was the year I fell in love with George Michael and learned that plastering my walls with his face made very nice wall paper.  Oh, my poor Daddy.

It was also the year that my formerly waist-length hair was cut into a normal teenager haircut for which I would take a can of hair spray, hold out my hair to the side, squirt it down with a very liberal hand and then dry the hairspray with the hair dryer, effectively giving myself shellacked wings.  I proudly traveled to school each and every day with hair like that.  BUT! Right before that hair happened, I thought I would experiment with a round brush on a Sunday morning and see how far I could roll my waist-length hair onto that brush. 

For those of you not in the know, round hair brushes look like this:

And waist-length hair looks like this:

Turns out rolling your hair onto the brush from the waist to the forehead is super easy.  Unrolling it even an inch, however, is nearly impossible.  I looked like Sally from Peanuts with a giant wad of hair stuck in a puffball that adorned my forehead.  And my poor, sweet Daddy-O found me hiding behind my bedroom door trying desperately to get that brush out of my hair before we had to leave for church.  If he rolled his eyes and sighed loudly, I do not recall, but I do remember him spending hours getting that brush out of my hair.  His only comment:  “Have you ever had your hair rat-combed before?  Because now you have . . .”

Happy Birthday, Daddy-O!  I love you!

Love, Sally (aka, your favorite oldest daughter)