"Home Perm" is a term that gives me the shivers to this day. You see, my home perm experiences were not fun or successful!
I experienced home permanents at two separate times in my life; first my mother gave me several perms when I was under the age of ten and then I tortured myself with them in the seventies when "afros" were in style.
The perms from those days were tricky, smelly, drippy and as unpleasant as smearing rotten eggs all over your head. The only reason the perm was something you did voluntarily was to get curly hair. More often than not, I would often end up with a head of dry and frizzy hair that was totally out of control making me look like a midget mad scientist.
Taking fine, thin and straight hair like mine and attempting to artificially turn it into a glorious mop of Shirley Temple curls usually resulted in a look that could easily have been duplicated by sticking my finger in an electrical socket. Something I was tempted to do after a couple of episodes - the tears that stemmed from my bad hair fiasco would have been an excellent conductor to hurry the process along!
At least when I was a kid I could blame fashion fads and my mother's desire to keep me in style. In the seventies, when I was in my early twenties, I had only myself to blame for the follicle fiasco I perpetrated. Not only did I attempt a home perm by myself, but I did it to my dyed red hair! Please cue the musical theme from the Bozo Show and Send In The Clown (me!)
