An Ode to Eva Gabor
Istill have my original crimping iron from the first day of the “Regretful Hair Styles 80s” era. It is the colour of pink candy floss and works better than anything new on the market. When it comes to crazy hair and makeup, no decade trumps the 1980s– but throwing this crimping iron out is out of the question at this point in my life.
I also used to also have a vintage Marcel iron in my hair styling repertoire that I found in my Grandparent’s barn on South Street in Cowansville, Quebec. Vintage curling irons were heated on the fire or the stove for the most part, so I used my grandmother’s wood stove to warm it up. I was warned never curl your
hair with a vintage curling iron as they are dangerous and you can burn your hair off, and might even singe your scalp. Each time I used it my grandmother would get hysterical and tell me to be careful.
Mary Louise Deller Knight got her first perm when she immigrated to Canada and it really didn’t go very well. My Grandmother kept telling the hairdresser her hair hurt under one of those over-sized dryers and no one listened. It was a sad day after that my friends. Mary loved to control everything in her life, and sad to say you can’t. That’s why hair was put on your head to remind you of that very thing. So after they lifted the lid, a lot of Mary’s hair fell out and eventually grew back very thinly.
Mary tried every potion and lotion known to man and finally she gave up, and that’s when Eva Gabor came into her life. They always say that beauty comes from inside– inside a hair salon actually– and we would make quarterly trips to Montreal to buy her wigs and I never ever discussed it. When she asked me questions about certain styles I chose my words very wisely—until her golden years. That’s when she plopped those wigs on her head sideways, backwards, and any other position known to man, and someone had to tell her. She made me promise if she died to make sure her wig was on straight which I did. Dead or alive– you need to look like you are not having a bad hair day, as after, all no one is looking at your shoes.