4.8.08

Ode to the Cana

Growing up, my mom was always concerned about her canas. It wasn’t uncommon for my mom to don a large black trash bag around her shoulders to protect her clothes from the jet black, goopy concoction massed in her hair.

The message was clear canas=the enemy.

In my early twenties, when I came across my first enemy, I examined it carefully in my 10X mirror. Was it simply a light colored hair or was it a legit cana?

When I determined that it, in fact, was a cana, I plucked it out. A few weeks later, it came back…with a friend. This time, I doused them in Cherry Jubilee goop.

After a rinse and some air dry time, it was made known that Thing One and Thing Two were resistant to such a thing. Unlike the rest of my hair, they’d only taken a smidgen of the hue. My canas were demure ladies on a date.

Gabi was the first to begin questioning the canas=the enemy theory when she stopped dying her hair. Suddenly, I became ultra aware of them.

I noticed how the less you mess with them, the cooler they look. Men with the salt and pepper look pretty nice. But my most remarkable observation was that many of these academic types I admired were cursed with them. Because they were associated with one of my pedestal dwelling ideas, my point of view shifted and my analogy did as well: canas=intelligence.

Now every new sapling is celebrated in my 10X mirror. I run my fingers across my hair in search of them and stare in wonder as the reflection of light glistens in the reflection of the mirror like a shooting star.

4 comments:

Msabcmom said...

If canas = intelligence then I am becoming more and more "gifted and talented" as each day goes by!!!

Have a good week!

-K

Clementina said...

I love canas--as long as they are not canas verdes--in which case I will return the favor to the one who gave them to me!

cindylu said...

Oh yeah, I'm really smart. I started dying my hair 3 years ago. I don't like doing it, but now it's like I'm trapped because the dye fades, my darker hair grows in along with the canas (which are pretty resistant to the dye, surpisigly) and I have to dye again. My hair is now a L'Oreal color called Chocolate. I like it.

jennifer said...

i love the idea of canas=intelligence. i'll have to remind myself of that every time i'm tempted to pluck one!