How to dry your hair without a hairdryer and other travel tips

22. October 2009 by Sherri.

Have you ever tried to dry your hair with a fan?  I have been traveling for over a week now, and my last stop is a retreat center.  I think it used to be a seminary for priests.  The rooms are austere: bed, desk, chair and closet with a couple wire hangers.  The shared bathrooms are down the hall.  It’s clean, but institutional.  This morning after my shower, I began to look around for a hairdryer.  There were none to be found.  I even peeked in closets and went down the creaky elevator to the next floor. No hairdryer.  I wondered if the nuns who live there use hair dryers, but I was too afraid I would get a lecture about vanity, so I didn’t ask. Then I thought of the small desk fan in my room. I headed back to my room and hauled the fan out of the closet. Plugging it in and hoisting it up to face level, I blew the cold air at my head, realizing the whole time how ridiculous I must look.  My next thought was, “if I catch my hair in the fan, it will really hurt!”  I then remembered that Thomas Merton was electrocuted by a fan while staying at a monastery in China. I look for loose wires. 

While I’m trying to “style” my hair with the fan, I hear a small tractor slowly making its way down the street, making a high pitched sound like a small jet engine.  It too is engaged in blowing things around, but instead of hair, it is blowing the leaves out of the street and back onto the grass.  “What a poor use of energy” I think to myself, arms aching as I attempt to dry my hair with the fan. As if we can “tidy up” Creation.  As if we can deny that it is autumn, and the leaves are going to blow everywhere, making a mess of the street.  Five minutes later, the breeze will blow the leaves right back where they were! Then it dawned on me.  What resources am I wasting in my vain attempts?  What am I trying to hide, trying to deny?  I spend a lot of my morning time, energy and resources trying to look presentable. I slather on lotion and makeup, trying to deny that the autumn of life is creeping into my face.  I think of my friend who has lost her beautiful silver hair to chemotherapy.  How freeing that must be!  Our culture tells us our hair must be sleek and shiny, our faces and clothing wrinkle-free.  We spend on a lot of time cleaning and primping and drying and ironing.  Yet how much of our morning time, energy and resources do we spend preparing our interior self for the day?  How much of our precious time, energy and resources do we spend on prayer and meditation of scripture?  So today, my hair will not look like it normally does.  Who cares?  Just me.  Will anyone notice?  I doubt it.  But I do know that it’s time to put down the fan and pick up my Bible, and talk to the One who doesn’t care what my hair looks like. 

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