Cynthia's Hair Diaries

By Cynthia Hilton

{Wife}

{Mom of four}

{Studying Nursing RN}

{Independent Consultant at Usborne Books & More}

"I'll admit it - lately I have been stubbornly sporting the colorless dishwater blond of my post-baby years, but today was transforming, both in color and style, and might I add, attitude. I haven't felt this sprightly since my Dorothy Hamill haircut back in second-grade, when my hair was still naturally flaxen. Since then it has gotten progressively darker, and I have tried everything short of a full dye job (highlights, Sun-In, shorter, longer, thinner, wavy, flatironed) in a battle to cling to the hair of my past. Though it had lost its albino-esque tone, as late as college my hair was still unusually blond. I have photos of me kneeling in the dusty anthropology museum storage room, a smooth sheet of sunshiny hair curtaining half my face as I pretend to scrutinize a piece of pottery for the photo. Traveling in Guatemala the summer after I graduated, my hair took on its own significance in a culture unaccustomed to fair hair; it incited small groups wherever I went...villages, markets, tiendas... I took it in stride, filing it away in my busy anthropological brain."

 "The next year I gave birth to my first child – a tiny slip of a girl with taped-on legs and an abundance of dark fuzzy hair; I marveled at the rich color of her baby tresses, comparing it to the almost imperceptible layer of white blond my mother calls my “birth” hair. On some level, I suppose I was disappointed that I had not passed on the gene for my still-glorious blondeness. However, once I got past the new mommy blitz, and had time to notice, I realized that my signature color was inexplicably sullied with a subversive darker blonde coming in behind the golden strands. I booked an emergency appointment with my hairdresser, who cited age and pregnancy hormones as the culprits. Indifferent to my grief, she told me I was lucky to have enjoyed such unadulterated blondeness for so long. This new information did not make things better, but my grieving was short-lived, as mommying soon dominated my life. Over the next few years spent as a full-time mom, I tried cutting it into a bob, and then a pixie (at least there wasn’t so much of the nasty color to look at). It was chin-length and mousy on the day I gave birth to my second - a soft, sweet little baby girl, who also emerged with tufts of brown hair. This time I was not sad that my offspring had not been gifted with ultrablonde. Photos over the next several years show me with closely cropped sandy-colored hair...being “rescued” from a bear (statue) by my Daniel Boone cap-wearing eldest, or on one of many beaches with a graduated bob streaked with artificial “summer” blonde, two little girls tumbling on the sand in the background. Thinking I was through with pregnancy hormones, I was optimistic that my color would plateau; I could find a way to cope with it, if only it would stop metamorphosing! But, along with the changes of my 30s (divorce, moving, career changes, return to school, new relationship), my hair morphed too, growing even darker and more serious, as though to verify that these were trying times."


"When I met my second husband, I had highlighted my long drab hair to the brink of a brittle death. We met online, and my close-up profile photo was that of a smiling, bright blond with one flirty chandelier earring peeking from the curtain of gold. He assumed this was my natural color; I smiled and offered up no objection. Imagine my agony when I became pregnant and could no longer chemically enhance my hair…it was time to come clean. My husband actually chuckled knowingly, and said the sunshine blond was not why he fell in love with me. This was a great relief in the twilight of my pregnancy, and at last, after an extended stay in the womb, my son was born, announcing his arrival with two lusty cries when he was only halfway into the world. His hair was jet black and luxuriant. Mine was sympathetically dark, with phantom streaks of true blond, and brassy chunks of old highlights. Ten days later, in a fit of postpartum indecisiveness, I had it hacked off into a crop, and with each snip I felt an unwanted doppelgänger being exorcised."

"I reveled in my short hair all over again, but we had moved, and in my pursuit of finding yet another new hairdresser, it grew it out. When I returned to work, I was able to pull it into a tiny, ridiculous ponytail, leaving a trail of bobby pins around the med-surg unit as I bent, squatted, lifted, carried, and half-jogged my way thru 12-hour shifts. By the time my fourth was born – a baby doll who came into the world with a ladylike sigh – I had a long and full ponytail...highlights compliments of a $12 kit from Rite-Aid. I was not happy about this; there was always something about my long, sunny blond that seemed a little too pat…a little too cliche. To make matters worse, my locks appeared to be inhabited by overnight hair fairies. I would begin each day with wild, leonine hair which could only be made to look presentable through a half-hour with the flatiron, my two eldest wandering in and out of my bathroom with some question or commentary, my son narrowly missing everyone’s toes with his ride-on rocket ship, my husband rushing through with a necktie in each hand, and the baby clinging to the backs of my knees, chewing on the stubby rubber handle of her toothbrush."

{Above you will find the ladies that inspired Cyndi's new cut}

"I went platinum today."

{See photos below}

"I realized one morning that a change was desperately in order, and karma agreed in the form of an introduction to my brilliant new hairdresser, Charlene. When she suggested going Monroe platinum, I surprised everyone, and myself most of all, by saying yes…yes to new, yes to bright, yes to grown-up blond. I decided this called for an entirely new hairstyle, and I spent many late-night hours (after my tribe had finally fallen asleep) on the web selecting a do that would banish mommy-ness, hair emergency hats and headbands, and lion mane hair, all in one decisive cut. At long last, I settled on an ambitious cut that promised to fill the bill, and Charlene was willing, and did not disappoint. At last, my hair has come into its own, and I have a new friend to guide me. She is armed with honesty, bravery, and a gift for hair. Thank you, Charlene Boggins, for your gentle genius."  

Charlene Boggins can be found in her studio at It's All About You day spa. She is available by appointment.

Call or text 

207.249.5458

"Whether you are seeking a precision cut, custom color or treatment, I take great pleasure in offering you a superior level of service that satisfies the high demands we all place on our hair today."

~Charlene Boggins