Back in ’67, when I was in the fifth grade, a classmate of mine, Colleen, came to school with frosted hair, which in today’s lingo means blonde highlights.  

Colleen’s mom (a licensed hairdresser) frosted Colleen’s hair. Why, we don’t know. What we do know is that my mom (bless her heart) seemed to be the only one in town triggered by this event. Everyone else either didn’t notice or figured that Colleen’s mom must have run out of heads to experiment on and so used her eleven year-old daughter’s head. It was beautiful. And I was very, very envious. But there’s more to this story. 

My dad was also a hairdresser. After touring the world in the Navy band (playing sax and clarinet) during the Korean War, dad set his sights on becoming a mechanic. If you had met him, you’d agree that that line of work would have been the right choice. However, he ended up in beauty school for the following reasons:

1. It cost less money than mechanic school. (I googled the cost of cosmetology school vs. mechanic school in the 1950’s and nothing came up because no one was making that decision it seems except dad. But really, it was mom who made the choice for him because…)

2. …her father agreed to hold the note on a new house (that was really old, built in 1920) for them. Said home happened to have an appendage like a peninsula in the form of a turn-key beauty parlor. Mom (bless her heart) imagined herself making coffees and teas for the customers and gossiping to her heart’s desire. Eventually, she imagined herself a Barber, but that’s another story.

All dad had to do was to finish his hand-painted sign and Mr. Jan’s Hair Salon was born. His business of $2.50 haircuts and $15 permanent waves thrived until around 1969 when the shag haircut became popular. Dad just couldn’t deal with hippies who did not want a helmet for hair. Now back to Colleen and me…

“I made a new friend,” I said to mom.

“Who?”

“Colleen. She’s the same age as me and she has frosted hair.”

“That’s not allowed,” replied mom.

“Then how come she’s got frosted hair?”

“Her mom’s a hairdresser, but she shouldn’t be doing that on such a young head.”

“Why?”

“She’s too young for frosted hair! End of story.” But it wasn’t…

Fast forward to the 1980’s when I fronted a few rock bands in spiked hair ranging from fire-engine red to cartoon blue-black to platinum blonde (my favorite). I guess I was rebelling? When I adopted the two-tone look (because hair grows out and getting it colored was expensive), people actually asked if some kind of animal was nesting upon my head. And when I outgrew all of that, I wore my hair frosted for many years.

Fast forward to my daughter, age 11, and one day (thinking I’d head things off at the pass; pun intended) I said, “Let’s go get your hair highlighted!”

“What’s that?” she replied.

“The hairdresser makes you hair a little more blonde. It will be fun and you’ll look cute.”

“Okay,” she said shrugging her shoulders as if she didn’t care at all.

Since Lucy was already a blonde, the highlights were very subtle reminiscent of Colleen’s long ago lights. I thought her new hair might cause a stir amongst her friends and that some kids would want highlights, but none did. The whole shebang, however, did inspire a “beauty birthday party” where (for Lucy’s twelfth) we treated her girlfriends to a beauty shop excursion in Honesdale where each one got to reinvent themselves with a new hair style. (No highlighting or cutting was involved.) It was all ponytails, cool barrettes and velvet scrunchies. 

Lucy never highlighted her hair again. However, while in college, she did shave it off entirely. But that’s another story.

RAMONA JAN is the Founder and Director of Yarnslingers, a storytelling group that tells tales both fantastic and true. She is also the roving historian for Callicoon, NY and is often seen giving tours around town. You can email her at callicoonwalkingtours@gmail.com.