Ahh, Spring! The season when everything just starts soaring out of the ground at the rate of knots, especially after the almost-drought-breaking amount of rain we've been having here in the Territory of the Free. Wednesday must be Mowing Day, because there were at least 5 mowers growling through the afternoon while I was trying to italicise the correct bits of a collection of essays on Blanchot (not speaking French gives me a distinct disadvantage in this task). Our lawn is remaining wild until this Saturday, which is the right and proper time to cut grass. One of my neighbours, I noticed as I strolled around the corner to crazybrave's house to rescue Bumblebee from homework procrastination, must have had a bad day, because a large part of their lawn is mown beautifully, while the other looks like they've shaved their legs without their glasses on. Maybe they did half each...
Speaking of which , Spring is also the time to decide whether to go sleek or hairy in the summer months. You ladies (and probably a number of men) will know what I mean.
I started shaving when I was about 14. I couldn't see hair on anyone else's arms, so I shaved not only under my arms, but on my arms. Then I noticed the hairs on other people's arms and felt utterly stupid. Anyhoo, my dad got cranky that I'd started shaving and had a big argument with my mother about it in front of me, the first time ever that they didn't disappear into a bedroom to have [barely muffled] 'words'. She defended me, like all good mothers do. She even went out and bought my first bra with me that day, just to prove a point. I guess he just had to cope with the onset of a rampant teenage daughter.
But he didn't cope when I went to uni and discovered proto-lipstick feminism. That is, I stopped shaving but I wore make-up. Dad railed at me about my hairy legs. I railed back: "First you wanted me to stop, then when I did stop, you want me to start! Is there anything else you'd like?" "Pay your own rent", he replied. Luckily he was joking, that time.
These days I do the continental thang -- well, my version of it, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Luxuriant leg growth in Winter, when I can wear as many layers as I want and camouflage is the name of the game. When thinner layers are needed (like now), I shed the fur -- but only on the legs. I like my little underarm pets, and refuse to see body hair as an evil that must be destroyed. I'm sorry to say my ex-military father still looks at me askance in Summer if I raise my arms near him, but since I'm happily married with one child and have fulfilled my womanly/daughterly duties, he's stopped giving me curry about it.
So I'm getting out the telephone number of the nice little waxing salon in Dickson; I'm prone to shaving my legs without my glasses on in the shower, and if I don't do it right with the first shedding of the season, my legs will look like the lawn down the road...
Please feel free to share your hair- /fat- /bastard- shedding stories here while I'm in a girlie mood (which isn't terribly often!)
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