Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Crotch Topiary & Other Delights

I have a heart. Actually, I have the remnants of a heart. I've been holding off writing this post for months now because I was sure it would be oodles funnier when it was all fixed and back to normal. Alas, I'm not sure that day is ever going to come so I am going to tell you now and get it over with.

I am a fairly fluffy person. I'm not sure why this is. My parents are not fluffy people. The rest of my family are also reasonably unfluffy. Somehow, I'm the lint bunny of the clan. My arms are well-insulated against arctic gusts and I'm fairly sure that my leg hair, if left to its own devices would eventually felt itself into a functional pair of slacks. Once upon a time I may have even been the reluctant owner of a rather luxurious unibrow.

The day I learned about razors was the day I stole one from my parents' bathroom and shaved almost everything off. The following day was when I realised this was not the smartest plan. Everything was unpleasantly prickly and no amount of hair gel would fix it (it made sense at the time). It didn't take my mother long to realise some education was required. Education and a slightly more kiddie-safe razor.

As the years went on my mass of long, soft, straight leg hair became an angry forest of dark stubble. It became so dark that I moved from having glaringly white legs into something more in fleabitten grey territory. I tried home waxing with those newfangled sugar strips but they did not agree with me. I sweated, I blurred, I threw up once or twice, and went into some sort of post-waxing shock. I decided it best to just shave the remaining hairy parts.

By this time I had developed a small but enthusiastic crotch forest. It was not the short and curlies that all the becoming a woman books talked about, the hairs there were long and straight and poked out of (and through) underwear and cozzies in unflattering ways. It took me a long while to even contemplate grooming that area because of the pre-emptive strike my mother had taken some years earlier that put liking girls with bare pubic areas a bit too close to liking much-too-young girls. Thanks Mum.

These days I do groom down there, and it is certainly not because I want to look much-too-young. I just don't like looking like I'm hiding a small tarantula ranch in my undergarments. At first I tried shaving but soon discovered that was a very limited time offer and any sex had to be had immediately to avoid super-excessive chafing. It took some time for it to dawn on me that if the hairs were gone, rather than just cropped to skin-level, the searing post-coital flames of hell might not be so painful. Given my rather unpleasant experiences with waxing and my reluctance to bend over and spread my butt cheeks to some poor beautician, I decided to do it myself. I asked questions, I found the right wax, I read all the blogs and forums... how hard could it possibly be?

Don't. Just don't.

I paced around the bathroom for several minutes before finally biting the bullet and calling Brandi. After explaining my waxy predicament and waiting for her laughter to die down, I sat on the cold floor, took a deep breath and pulled off the tiny strip of wax. I squeaked. I felt tears falling down my face. I looked in the mirror, I looked at the wax, I looked back to my very uneven, very lopsided pubic hair, then finally back to the wax. I picked up the lid and screwed it on. Roll on, weeks of asymmetry. Roll on, years of Brandi asking about the status of my fuzzy bits.

You would think that living with somewhat impressionist crotch hair for months would have taught me my lesson, but no. I tried this tear-jerking procedure three more times with very similar results before I finally threw out every pot of hard wax in the house and tried to embrace my 70's bush.

I tried and failed.

A white bikini and 70's bush is not a great look. Blindingly pale skin peppered with spotty black stubble is also not too flash. After some chatting with the primped and preened vanilla folk in my life I decided I was in need of something with a bit more grunt and several fancy attachments. I wanted mains power and the ability to yank out several dozen hairs in a single move. I wanted... an epilator.

Oh boy, did I want that epilator! I giggled and cooed and squeaked and sweated and by the time I got around to attacking my bikini line, my knickers were well and truly soaked through. I wasn't exactly mentally aroused, but my body was thoroughly enjoying the systematic plucking. I just couldn't stop. More hair! Arthur popped in once or twice and, after seeing my flushed cheeks and broad grin, walked away shaking his head and laughing. I admit, I did hit the edge of my pain tolerance before I was completely free of body hair, but at least I was trimmed and symmetrical. It was a far, far better experience than waxing ever was.

I think that is why I got cocky. Well, a combination of epilator invincibility and an article I read when I was 13 years old about Winona Ryder and her heart-shaped pubic hair. At the time it had struck me as rather unattainable because I could not figure out how to get symmetrical curves using wax. It seemed to require some exotic skills that I did not posess. Epilation, however, was just a hairy sort of craft. I could do crotch craft!

Anna + craft supplies + power tool = crotch topiary brilliance.

I admit I started simple, I realised my teenage dream of having a Winona-inspired heart emblazoned on my mound. It was perfect. I used Contact paper to design my heart and just went to town pulling out every hair that was not covered. I then tidied things up with tweezers, added a little posing in front of a mirror, and called it a day. I was feeling pretty darn proud of myself. If I could make a heart with this technique, why not lightning bolts or crabs or little Space Invaders aliens?

Aaand this is where it all went pear shaped. Pubic hair is a funny thing. It never behaves as you expect that it should. I expected that all of the hair I removed would grow back fairly quickly, and it did. What I did not expect was for it to grow back much thicker and darker than the stencilled heart. I certainly did not expect for it to stay like that through full hair removals and a couple of partials. It has been almost a year and my body is refusing to give up this little bit of whimsy.

I seem to have permanently branded myself a lover. Still, It could be worse, I could have permanent crabs. A small part of me is disappointed that I wasn't more ambitious. It would be pretty damn cool to be able to drop my pants and flash the bat signal, don't you think?

6 comments:

Jade Kaper said...

This is a great story! Made me laugh out loud! Also reminded me of the first time I stole my dad's razor to shave my legs. I was 13 and had no pubic hair or armpit hair but all my friends were shaving so I decided to do my legs, but had no plans to tell my mother. She totally busted me because I snuck out of the house with my friend to spy on the neighbor boys here were having a late night pool party. They spotted us and we ran toward my house. I (of course) tripped and sprained my knee. My dad had to come carry me home and the first thing my mom said when she was inspecting my swollen knee was "Who on earth said you could shave your legs?" Good times...

Curvaceous Dee said...

*winces*

Hair is funny stuff, isn't it? We love and coddle it on some parts of our bodies, and go on defoliation agent orange outrages on other parts.

I must admit, it never occured me to me to make shapes with it, though!

xx Dee

Sex Fairy said...

Very funny! I just started growing a 'pussyhawk' myself...

Dangerous Lilly said...

Oh yes a couple years ago I was going to go the home-wax-kit route myself. I made my husband help, for various reasons. He didn't want to though, he's not a sadist at all and didn't want to hurt me. But he did it. He wasn't very good. He did one strip and I cursed and yelped. He did another strip and I howled and rolled away. And after all that? He barely even removed any hair. I had a few small spots that were luxuriously waxed-smooth. Tiny spots. Looked more like leprosy or chemo or something.

If I go the less painful route of shaving and use an electric razor, I end up with a shadowy look like you describe for your legs. Come to think of it, my legs kinda do that, too. Little dots. And shaving with a blade seems to be a pointless endeavor for me as I've never successfully done it without pain and bumps and redness and then a 5 o'clock shadow in less than 24 hours. I've tried creams and stinky powders.

All because I am way too chicken and way too embarrassed to go get a salon wax job. I'm not sure I can take the pain and I don't want to go being this weight.

I say, try a full salon job. Suck it up and get it waxed. And then get one of those nice-but-natural spray tans. And use a bat-signal sticker on your pubic mound, that way you'll have a shape, it just won't be made of hair ;)

littlemonkey said...

I almost died laughing. It's so funny because I can relate, and that is all i will say.

foreverthequeerestkids said...

I almost spilled soup all over myself, I was laughing so much! Love your humor and creativity. The girlfriend is considering laser hair removal to keep the area soft, but it's so bloody expensive. I may keep in mind about the epilator though....

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