Best Mom Tip #156: Ignore the other moms, Part 1

I waste a lot of my mental time and energy comparing myself to other moms. This frequently happens at the YMCA, but it can be just about anywhere I go. I will come out of a class or in from a run looking like my face has been replaced by a giant beet and I inherited my hair from Grandma Medusa and I will see a tall, thin, graceful mom herding her children toward the car. She is slightly sweaty, but really, on her it looks good.

A lot of the super-fit moms are in the running club. This is why the running club intimidates me. They say things like, "I'm going to do 8 miles on Thursday." Then they jog off in their coordinating visors and running skirts. They also bond and chat while they run. I am capable of making one noise while running and it is a sound that, if you heard it coming from your dog, you would go ahead and have the poor thing put down.

I will later see these same moms at PTA and church and the grocery store and I will feel bad that they have long, flowing hair while I am still growing mine out from the decision I made two years ago to have 1-inch-long hair with pink and purple highlights. I'm not sure what I was thinking.

They dress well. They use "accessories." They seem to remember to put on makeup when they leave the house. Even the running club moms. I talked with one mom today who had on eyeliner under her visor. How did she get that to stay on? My actual skin was melting off of my face because it is August and this is Georgia. Turns out her kid sits across the table from my kid in the first grade so I am going to have to continue to feel inadequate in her presence.

I'm trying to overcome this problem. I recognize that my constant comparing myself to others affects no one but myself. I realize that it dings my self esteem and belittles my efforts at health, fitness, and my general sense of well-being. So I'm going to try. My first step is to actually get to know the people who intimidate me the most.

When my beautiful, size-zero friend Jill had a baby and still had to deal with the fact that her clothes didn't fit right afterwards, it made me realize that skinny girls feel the same way I do. We are all just trying to figure out how to function as moms and wives and co-workers and volunteers and feel good about ourselves at the same time. I will try to remember this again later today when I am faced with an amazon mother of 3 and her perfectly toned legs. Really. I'm trying.

Really.

Best Mom Tip #149: Know what your hair says about you

I am not careful with my hair. In my adult life my hair has been between 2 inches and 2 1/2 feet long. It has been really dark brown (my natural color), red, blonde, pink, and purple. Those last two were at the same time. I have had highlights, bobs, pixie cuts, you name it.

Last night I dyed my hair "warm light brown" to cover up the fact that my highlights were growing out and I can't really afford to keep up $75 every two months. My hair is currently in a bob about chin length and as I blew it dry and carefully styled it I thought, "Hey, I look like me again." This is generally a good thing, but I'll come back to it in a minute.

Before I go any further, I need to share a moment of my life from nearly a decade ago.

In my mid-to-late 20s I was teaching with some of my favorite coworkers of all time. They were (and are) special people who made me laugh, encouraged me to be a better teacher, and shared pina coladas with me by the pool during the summer. One day I was walking down the hall with two other women in their 20s and a male coworker joked that we looked like Charlie's Angels. We all laughed and did our best gun-toting poses.

Then I looked at beautiful, blonde Jill and tall, leggy Katie and thought, "Dammit. I'm Kate Jackson."

Now, I don't have anything against Kate Jackson. And I bet some of you don't even know who I'm talking about. But in the 70s-era Charlie's Angels (that my parents let me watch in syndication for some unknown reason) there were Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith, and Kate Jackson. Here's a picture of them in their groovy glory (Kate is the one on the left.)

Kate (Sabrina on the show) was the kinda sporty, kinda smart one. She's cute, but not glamorous. She was eager and had a big smile, but no one ever fantasized about Kate Jackson...

Back to the present and my hair and what Charlie's Angles has to do with it all:

Right after I thought I looked like me again, it hit me that I also looked like Kate Jackson again.

So what does my Kate Jackson hair say about me? That if there is going to be a photo shoot they're going to hand me the walkie-talkie/tape recorder thing and not the pistol. Which is sad because I would really like to use the pistol.

That I would be a terrible spy who would tell everyone everything I know just so we could be friends.

It says that if you need a party guest who will talk to anyone, I'm your girl. Honestly, I have been told many times that my job at a party is to talk to the uncomfortable people and give them something to say.

You don't send Farrah to make shy people feel more comfortable.

At least I am aware of what my hair is telling the world. I am not glamorous. I'm the friendly face who will ask interested questions and show unbridled enthusiasm about dry topics like the Roman Empire and medieval warfare. I am good at reading stories to little kids (I am very animated and do voices). I can make you laugh in just about any circumstance, even at a funeral.

There are certainly worse things to be than the less-sexy Angel. Bosley, for instance.

So what does your hair say about you?