What Not to Wear? Straight hair

After another long day in the "What Not to Wear" studios, I'm finally back in my very chic hotel, and I have most of my goods I bought this week with me (and some even on my body!). I have a suitcase full of super cute things and a hanging bag full of quite nice pieces. And don't forget the boxes and shoes and other things they are going to have to ship to me next week!

I finished shopping yesterday, so today was hair and makeup and the final "reveals" to hosts Stacy London and Clinton Kelly. Let's just say they were quite impressed. One of the most dramatic changes they've made on the show, they said, though I guess they could be lying. We covered the rock 'n' roll look, the work look and the casual cute look, and you're going to have to wait for the show to see exactly what I mean by those!

All you get to see now are a pair of my really cute new shoes, mine are the top pair, along with Stacy and Clinton's shoes (I have a thing about taking pictures of my feet wherever I go) to prove I really was with those two this week...



The main changes I underwent today were for hair and makeup. Nick, the hair stylist, and Carmindy, the makeup artist, have been with the show since the beginning and are probably as well known as the hosts. Nick has a studio in New York, where he charges $500 for a haircut! Carmindy splits her time between New York and Miami and just created her own line of makeup, which will soon be in drugstores across the country.



I met Nick for a second on Wednesday for a consultation, and he was first this morning. After some foil and highlighting, then came some overall coloring, the outcome of which I wasn't really expecting. Then came the scissors, which I knew was coming. You're going to have to wait until after my reveal to find out exactly what he did, but it was OK at first.

I mean, honestly, no one really knows what the hell they are doing with curly hair unless it is there own curly hair. One of the big themes of the haircutting part of the show was that I cut my own hair now, which neither the hosts nor Nick were really impressed with. I tried to explain that it was because everywhere I go, the stylist cuts my hair as if it were straight, which it clearly is not. So a few years ago, I got tired of wasting my money on mediocre (at best) cuts. I won't claim that I was doing the best job, but I was certainly doing better than some of the stylists I had been to. Plus, the thing about curly hair is that you don't have to cut it perfectly because the curls hide the imperfections. Anyway, let's just say if I'd spent $500 on a haircut from Nick, I'd be asking for my money back (sorry, Nick, if you read this!).

But here I was, in front of three cameras and the stylist himself, so I grinned and bared it, thinking the whole time, "Well, it'll be better when I can get my own hands on it." But at least he didn't straighten it, right? Oh, just wait.

Carmindy, who is an absolute delight, hooked me up with a killer makeup job, and she even gave me about $100 worth of it because she's getting ready to launch this new line and had some extra supplies. I was elated after my experience with her. I really think she's one of the most down-to-Earth people on the whole show.

So, after makeup came the section of the show were I put on three different outfits (NOT chosen by me, which was a surprise) to show to Stacy and Clinton. Thing is, Stacy and Clinton pick out the outfits for me to wear! They did a pretty good job of putting together a nice array of my wardrobe, but halfway through the reveal section comes a hair stylist with a blow dryer and a big round brush, every curly-headed person's worst nightmare. And away he goes. I tried to keep my chin up, but I knew, just knew what was happening, and I didn't like it one bit.

But the whole point of the show is trying out news things and being open to change, so I roughed it out. They didn't let me look at myself in the mirror, but I felt it on my head. They'd flattened my signature curls into something I knew I wouldn't even recognize. I peaked in my reflection in a glass window, and that's when the tears came. I'd made it so far on the show without crying! But I couldn't help it. They'd taken what I spent two decades struggling so hard to accept, through all the horrible nicknames like "Mop 'n' Glo" and "Afro Sheen," and turned it into what I'd always wanted -- perfectly coiffed, straight-as-a-board hair. But it looked like an awful wig on me. I felt like I'd been stripped of me, the me they were trying to help me get in touch with with all these new clothes. I tried to will the tears away, but they wouldn't stop. I tried to convince myself that it wasn't permanent and that it was just a stupid television show and that I could wash the straight right out of my hair as soon as I got home.

The series producer happened to be there, and he pulled me aside and told me they'd do whatever I wanted to do. If I wanted to go back to curly, they'd do it. But I wanted to really see if Stacy and Clinton were worth their fashion salt, so I went to them with a pleading look in my eyes. "What do you think?" I asked. They knew. They saw right away what I was talking about. Stacy sat me down in the couch in her office and listened to my whole schpeal about the struggle to embrace my hair as it was. She was willing to let me do whatever I wanted, but she wanted me to at least think about doing a single outfit with straight hair and facing this demon in front of the camera. To show that curly hair, mine or anybody else's, doesn't have to be as limiting as it might feel sometimes. To show that curly-haired people, too, have options just like the straight-haired "normal" folks I envied as a younger person.

It sounds menial to go on and on as I have about this incident today with my hair, but it's about more than that. It's about identity. My curly hair is as much apart of who I am as my outgoing personality or my silly, bad jokes. It's as playful as me and reminds me of the crazy curly genes passed through each member of my family. It is a single item that represents my struggle to fit in as an adolescent female. As I stood there in all these fancy clothes and fancy shoes in a fancy studio in a fancy town, my heart was breaking at the thought of taking those curls away. On freaking national television, mind you.

But then I realized that maybe I was being given my chance to get what I'd been asking for during all those self-conscious years. The straight hair I'd always wanted, which, now that I had it, I loathed with every ounce of my being. I told them I'd go on camera with it straight if I could have it curly for the last reveal. They said yes. I dried my eyes, and they retouched my makeup. I walked on that set with as much confidence as I could muster, but I felt like that awkward, nervous junior high schooler again, just in better clothes. I hadn't wanted straight hair in a long, long time, and now I never, ever, ever will again. Careful what you wish for, you might actually get it. On freaking national television, so everyone can see.

I write this with just a few hours until my flight back to Austin. I got my curls -- and my emboldened confidence -- back for the last reveal and now for the engagement party tomorrow night. Now, the only tears I will shed will be of sheer happiness to see my fiance, my baby and my family members, who've driven down from Missouri for the big night. I can't wait.