at least I find these adventures to qualify as within the borders of Uber-Crunchy Land. Some may disagree. Some may say I’ve only dabbled in the suburbs. Of course, others would say, Lady, you’ve entered a world of Crunch I’ve never even heard of! To each his own. Or her own. Or their own, I suppose, is what the kids these days are saying . . .
So I haven’t washed my hair or face all week. Yep. No soap on my face, no shampoo in my hair, all week. My friend posted a link on her Facebook status last week, or earlier, I forget. The link was all about not using shampoo on your hair. Going ‘Poo Free. I followed that link to another post on facial cleansing without soap/face-wash/etc. So, I figured, What the heck?!
Wait. Did I figure What the heck??!!! (as in, What are these people thinking??!!) Or What the heck? (as in, What do I have to lose?)
Actually, it was the latter. Hence the title of this post. Otherwise it would be “My recent look at the brochures for Uber-Crunchy Land and subsequent rejection of its hospitality.”
So, first the face. It’s called the Oil Cleansing Method. Its basic principles made sense to me. Oil dissolves oil, and the more you dry out your face (skin in general), the more oil your skin produces. Sure. Makes sense. So I tried it. And you know what? So far I like it. My skin is lovely and glowy and apparently I don’t have to wash it so frequently. I recommended it to my husband two nights ago and he gave it a try. Then last night he made mention of how excited he is that I told him he doesn’t have to use soap anymore. Give an inch . . .
So, my lingering questions on the OCM: If you shouldn’t do this every day, what do you do the other days, if you wear make-up? Cuz there’s the rub, I suppose. I’m just a visitor in Uber-Crunchy Land. At best, a suburbanite. At worst, either a suburbanite who actually claims to live in the heart of the Land, or one of those people who doesn’t even come close to living in the suburbs but just takes those day-tripper shopping buses into the Land once in a while. Point is, I still have make-up to wear. Skin-tone to even, eyes to accentuate. So what do I do with that on the nights of no-OCM? Points to ponder . . .
On to the second leg of my journey. ‘Poo Free. Isn’t that a lovely phrase? My friend linked here, but there’s more information out there. Similar to the OCM, this system works with your body’s natural oil production. Shampoo cleans your hair of the dirt and gunk you want out of your hair, but also strips it of its natural oils, its self-maintenance oil. So, of course, your body goes into over-drive to make more of it. Again, makes sense to me. Sure, I’ll give it a try.
So I did it. Twice now, with two days in between of not wetting my hair at all. I’m not a wash every day kind of girl, so this was no change for me. Apparently there can be this transition time when you’re no longer stripping the natural oils out, but your body is still pumping them out as if you are and so your hair can get worse before it gets better, but so far that’s not been the case for me. But two washings is not a lot of time. So, we’ll see.
Lingering questions: Um. Still putting gunk in it, here. Well, some kind of curl cream (or creme) and hairspray. Is the baking soda enough to get the gunk out? We’ll see. And, I’m not sure what kind of system to implement where I don’t have to mix stuff up every time I go to wash my hair. Also, both times I’ve done it I’ve come out of the shower with hives on my forehead. That can’t be good, right?
We’ll see. I think I have some adjustments to make on the hair washing front, but I do like the OCM for my face. So now I’m off to find out what I’m supposed to be doing with the rest of my body . . .
But before I do that . . . some further reflections on my citizenship relative to Uber-Crunchy Land. I think I set up the metaphor all wrong. I’ve been talking about it like it’s a city. That doesn’t exactly fit with all the earth-loving, tree-hugging, natural-living stuff that defines Uber-Crunchy Land. Really, it’s more like vast farmland, open skies, lush green earth. Man and beast coexisting peacefully in perfect symbiosis with nature. As it was intended. And maybe I’m that city dweller moving out to the farmland, pretending to be Uber-Crunchy, but building my house next to a pig farm and wondering why my back yard smells**. . . . How do I get this make-up off? How do I get this hairspray and curl creme out of my hair?
Yeah. I’m not there yet. I just enjoy visiting, taking a look around, enjoying the scenery and buying some local produce before heading back on my Greyhound. And putting in a quick call to my beauty consultant when I get home.
**I kid you not: I did not make up this part of the analogy. A couple built a beautiful (big ol’, made to look like an old farmhouse, but really brand new state-of-the-art McMansion) house next door to a 100 year-old pig farm and complained to the township powers-that-be that their backyard smells. Couldn’t make that up. Used it in my Uber-Crunchy Land illustration despite the fact that we all know there wouldn’t be a pig farm in Uber-Crunchy Land.
