"Oh, Where Is My Hairbrush?"

   Although some of you may recognize this question as a famous Veggie Tale song, which is now annoyingly plaguing your mind, but it is also a frequently asked question in our home.  It started with my oldest daughter, who could never find her hairbrush and would leave it in random places and then emerge with the famous question, “Where is my hairbrush?” to which my husband and I would begin to sing it in the Veggie Tale sing-song way, which usually sent her spinning on her heels to go and find it herself! Not very nice, I know, but sometimes, we just couldn't help ourselves!

  This brings me to the thought I have been thinking lately about hairbrushes, in general.  Do any of you have the fond and blissful vision in your mind of Laura Ingles, sitting on a hand-made wooden chair in long, white night gown while her mother lovingly brushed her hair?  She's blissfully gazing up at her mother whose hands are soft and gentle and she is quite possibly humming as she gracefully and delicately strokes her hair with a brush that never pulls or hurts, but rather seems to sooth and lull to sleep the recipient of such loving care.  Well, that in my mind, is the way every little girl's hair should be brushed.

   Then, there's reality.  

    After having three girls, you'd think I had this down.  I mean, I had two sisters and I AM a GIRL!  And you'd think that after nearly 15 years of motherhood, I could have managed to figure out how to mimic this dream-like vision of love and tenderness of one of the most basic motherly tasks, as brushing a daughter's hair.  But, no.  Our reality (and most possibly yours as well) entails screams of terror and running to hide when the brush even makes it's appearance!  Then when I finally do catch one of them, I get pleading and tears!  I went to school for two years as a Cosmetologist and have worked with hair for over 18 years, for crying out loud!  Why does this have to be so complicated?!  How can I be such a horrible mother just because I have to get tangles out so that when they go to school then next day, the teacher doesn't think these children were just shipped in from the local orphanage?! 

    I, like the more diligent mothers, who really do care and make an effort, have tried to make this a more loving event, and no, I don't really have to chase them down each night, BUT, it still entails occasional crying and me begging them to be still and saying things like, "I promise, I'm trying to be careful."  I have even developed a strategy which proves to work quite well, in which I comb through their conditioned hair while they're still in the bathtub.  All the conditioner in their hair helps me work through their fine, blond hair much more smoothly and without much wailing involved.  I also keep a bottle of de-tangler handy to use while combing out after their hair has been towel dried.  As a side note, here's a handy tip.  Instead of buying a new spray bottle of de-tangler each time you run out, just reuse the one you've bought already.  Besides, you only bought it because of the Princesses on it, anyway!  When it runs out, just squirt some regular conditioner down into it, and then add water.  Shake it up well, and wha la... you've got your own home made de-tangler!  

    Well, as before mentioned, my Cosmetology schooling....one of the things we received once we enrolled in Cosmetology school, was a kit.  It was wonderful!  Mine was a big brownish-tan, pleather satchel filled with goodies!  If you love doing things with hair, they would be called, “goodies.” If hair makes you gag, then you would not consider this a perk! Then again, you probably wouldn't be enrolled in Cosmetology school...but I digress. In it were all the tools we were going to learn to use and need throughout Cosmetology school as well as be a help later in our career as a basic kit of supplies for when we worked in a salon.  In this kit was a very curious object, which became a very fascinating and valuable object to me.  It was a boar-bristle brush.  When I was first told what it was, I thought they were lying.  I mean, really, who was the idiot who was chosen to pluck out nasty bristles from a boar to clean, cut straight and insert into a piece of wood that would one day women would love to have flow through their hair?!  Not!  Well, as I grew in knowledge at this school, I learned that indeed there were such things as boar-bristle brushes.

As it turns out, they were made because this natural, rather than synthetic material helps distribute oils down the hair shaft better and thus creating healthy, shiny hair. Any good hair-stylist will have one in their arsenal of tools to tame the mane. Metal and plastic bristles are much more damaging to fine hair and thus the boar-bristle brush is a very handy tool, though it may frizz out thicker locks, if left without styling afterwards, so beware. These were the common brushes used even in the most refined homes and in fact were most likely the same type of brush that Laura's mother probably used on her.  You may have also heard the theory that little girl's of that time would say that they should brush their hair 100 times each night? Well, I had heard that, but thinking about ripping my plastic brush through my hair, or that of my daughter's hair 100 times each night, would pretty much result in baldness.

   Well, I think I had a revelation, just the other day.  I mean, I could be wrong...but I don't think I am.  How many years of being a mother and a Cosmetologist did it take me to put two and two together?  You probably figured it out, half way through the previous paragraph..... But, let us pretend you didn't know either, and we are figuring it out together. Well after reaching my brilliant conclusion, lets just say that now I have dug out that old boar-bristle brush and begun to use it on my daughter's beautiful corn-silk locks.  I still get the tangles out in the tub the night before, while the conditioner is on, and so the comb is still in use, but in the morning before school, there is no crying. There is no running for their lives.  There is now a blissful moment where they snuggle their little heads into my waist as I lovingly stroke their hair with my boar-bristle brush.  I even try to squeak out a little hum, just to add to the ambiance.  It's like magic!