Just Take A Little Off The Top. . .
When I was a little girl I shaved off half of each of my eyebrows. I didn’t do it to make a statement or send a message or to be cool. I did it out of pure curiosity and a burning desire to be all grown up. My friend Laura and I locked ourselves away in her room one afternoon. She had stolen her mom’s make-up and assured me that we were allowed to play with it. After carefully painting our faces, she brought out her mom’s razor. She shaved one stripe up each of her legs, and took the peach fuzz off of her toes. I wanted to shave something, so I thought I’d take a tiny bit off of my eyebrows. I took just a few hairs off of the top of both when I realized that I now had uneven brows. To correct this, I took a little more off of the other side, which caused them to be uneven in the other direction. This evening out continued until both eyebrows were over half gone, and I had given up knowing that I wasn’t going to have eyebrows left if I continued. We stashed the stolen make-up and then, forgetting our new found “maturity”, went out to play.
My mother picked me up a few hours later, and we went to buy some groceries at Cash Wise Foods. I can still point out the exact end of the isle where my mother finally took a good look at me and discovered my mutilated brows. You must know that of all of my features, my mother is most proud of my beautiful eyebrows. You see, most babies have no eyebrows when they are born, but I had lots of hair and two perfectly formed brows, and they were the talk of the nurses in the hospital where I was delivered. It is also notable that I was born into the era of Brooke Shields, and full eyebrows were very much the trend. My mother was proud that a genetic twist had given me such an edge up on beauty, so when my perfect brows had all but disappeared, she was horrified, to say the least.
She had me trapped between herself and a shelf of canned corn and began firing inquiries about the state of my eyebrows. Had I plucked them? Did I let Laura pluck them? I repeatedly answered no, insisting that nothing had happened. After all, she hadn’t landed on what I’d really done, and I suddenly had the impression that she just might flip her lid if I confessed. I kept up the stalemate for a little while longer, until I realized that I was going to be trapped with the corn until my mother had a good answer. I finally muttered that I had shaved them. This did not help the situation. After many pathetic explanations and a lot of curious shoppers walking by, my mother finally told me that sometimes when people cut their eyebrows off, they don’t grow back. My mother chastised me by saying that it would be all my fault if I had ugly, misshapen brows for the rest of my life and had to paint them on in a perpetually surprised pose like one of the old ladies my grandmother worked with. I had been blessed with naturally beautiful brows, and I had utterly destroyed them.
There is nothing like guilt to teach a child a lesson. I spent the next month worried sick over the state of my eyebrows, knowing that unless they grew back, I would look weird for the rest of my life. Thankfully, they did grow back. Now I see things from my mother’s point of view, and hope Maggie never gets creative with a razor, because I know I’ll be the one in a tizzy by the corn.
Oh my goodness! Girl! You crack me up!!!!!!
Comment by Adrienne — March 13, 2006 @ 7:05 pm
why are we all in such a hurry to start up the love affair with the razor? if we only knew…lol…
Comment by Dawn — March 13, 2006 @ 7:36 pm
That was truly funny. I remember shaving my arm at that age. I think I will definately have a talk about female grooming issues with all three of my daughters before they get ideas of their own.
Comment by Kristi — March 13, 2006 @ 9:00 pm
Funny girl!!!
I trimmed my eye lashes when I was young. I had heard that they would grow back longer and thicker. Little did I know that Mascara would do the same thing.
Comment by Kim in Camas - ScrapToMyLu — March 13, 2006 @ 10:41 pm
I plucked my eyebrows when I was 13. And, to showcase my fine (ahem) work — I also trimmed my bangs. My wet bangs.
Yeh. It was horrible.
Comment by Kim — March 14, 2006 @ 1:36 am
Too funny! So far as a mom I have had only two cut their hair (both around age 4)– no eyebrow shaving yet.
Mary mom to 8
Comment by Owlhaven — March 14, 2006 @ 3:35 pm
ROFL! That is hilarious! I ahev yet to deal with gum in the hair or impromptu haircutting… knock on wood!
Comment by Lei — March 14, 2006 @ 8:53 pm
A mother’s lies are AMAZING!
I hated putting Zync Oxide on my nose at the pool and my mom said that there were only 7 layers of skin on our noses and once all seven peeled off, you would be stuck with a “skeletor” (from the show He-Man) nose for the rest of your life.
I was petrified and every time my nose would peel I would do the math in my head - Ohhh, only 5 more layers…
Comment by soapbox.SUPERSTAR — March 14, 2006 @ 9:45 pm
LOL! I just stuck to destroying the hair on my cousin’s barbies (heaven forbid I would make my own look ugly like that…)
Fun site; I love the background you’ve chosen!
Comment by Amber — March 15, 2006 @ 11:19 pm
ahahahahhaha I cant type I am giggling so hard!
Comment by Lawanda — March 18, 2006 @ 5:58 pm
I can so relate. My “best feature” - the one everyone talked about incessantly was my eyelashes and how long they were. In perfect 7 year old rational thinking (I don’t really remember the complete train of thought) I not only trimmed them, I basically cut them off. My mother didn’t notice, however, my Aunt, visiting us, noticed at dinner that evening. Imagine my mother when I didn’t even have the excuse of trying to fix something that started out so innocently. You are right - guilt works wonders. Of course, I would never do anything like that to my kids… ahem.. really… never.
Comment by Safira — March 30, 2006 @ 6:43 am
I had the same thought awhile ago due to curiosity so I ended up in shaving the whole eyebrows I wonder will they grow back.
Comment by Wyman — March 21, 2007 @ 9:36 am
um.. i just kind of shaved half of my eyebrow of..ACCIDENTLY OF COURSE. My mom hasn’t seen it yet though. She is in an “intense” hour-long phone call with her friend.I have this huge head-band over my eyebrows. My mom doesn’t suspect anything..yet…and thinks I am just trying to be funny. What do I do? I already tried coloring them in, but that just made it worse. I had these huge lucious eyebrows, but then, I kind of noticed some hair in between them. So I got my dad’s ELECTRIC razor and shaved the middle off. But then I thought, “Hey, since this looks so good, why don’t I do all the stray hair around my brow!” So as I was doing the hair on the side of my left eyebrow, but got a tad to close and ended up shaving half my brow off. Ahh! What do I do?
Comment by Eye Brow Problem Girl — May 24, 2007 @ 4:43 pm
My 10 year old daughter, Maggie, SHAVED off her eyebrows yesterday in the same manner as you. What a shock it was to see. I totally comforted her because I was so scared for how she would be treated at school. Should I have been more like your mom? Geez, this motherhood thing is crazy….. ; )
Comment by Ann Munn — January 31, 2008 @ 7:21 am