“My hair is dis-gus-ting!” Good4 shouts, whizzing past me into the bathroom. The door slams. “It’s soooo greeeaaaasy!” I hear muffled through the door. And that’s the only sound for a while, except those associated with lather-rinse-repeat.
Grease is not really my problem. Volume is. At this point in the joyous holiday, my hair most closely resembles a modern afro: big, frizzy, and kinky, but less stylish. I lift a dry, frizzy lock, and think wistfully that, if this were only a four-day chag, I’d have the set-up for a lovely head of dreadlocks.
I do like dreadlocks. At least on black people. White people can’t seem to make them look right. Somehow, they always look like they fell asleep for a month with their hair in a bowl of peroxide. But maybe I could set a new trend. Nice, neat, white-person dreads, compliments of a season of three-day chagim. I could move to Bat Ayin and be the envy of all the hippies. All I need to do is not wash my hair.
“Haven’t you taken a shower yet?” my mother interrupts my meditation.
“Nah, I’m seeing how long I can go.”
And really, how hard can that be? Inertia. Why start now, after three days without? All that detangling and moisturizing and washing hair down the drain… it’s easier not to.
“It’s a kapara on all my avonos,” Good4 says fervently, exiting the bathroom in a trail of steam, her hair wrapped in a towel. “That’s what I keep telling myself about a three-day yom tov. It’s a kapara on all my avonos.”
“You really think you have so few avonos?” I ask, dropping the future-dread I was trying to curl.
I think there’s another reason Hashem gave us three-day chagim. So that we’ll dream of wearing a sheitel. Hair you can hang up at night. Hair that looks the same the next morning. Hair that, if you don’t like how it looks, you can just put away.
But until then, I’ll have my dreadlocks.
Bad for Shidduchim 
That is the raison d’etre for shaitels, I think, the 3-day yomtov. For the other 345 days per year, it’s no picnic.
For Good4:
To keep oil at bay, I would suggest—
1) Do not shampoo hair every day (in general). Constant shampooing strips hair of oils, making the scalp produce more to compensate. Less shampoo, less oil.
2) Condition only the ENDS of hair. All sorts of icky buildup accumulates when conditioning the scalp.
3) Rinse hair all over (as well as the scalp) with a solution of water and apple cider vinegar. The vinegar really helps hold off on the oil.
http://frumanista.blogspot.com/2013/07/apple-cider-vinegar-not-just-for-salads.html
4) When the oil does surface, dust scalp with cornstarch or dry shampoo—lightly—which should absorb the worse of the oils.
As for Bad4, the vinegar works great for volume as well. At least, it really helped for me.
And here I thought three-day chagim were Gd’s reminder to make Aliyah. (Although, yes, we do have to endure them here occasionally too.)
Bonus: my husband’s got all these brilliant solid-frum single friends here, and I know surprisingly few single females to set them up with…
🙂
Rosh HaShana is two days over there too! You had a three day yontif this year as well, no?
Rosh Hashana is two days here too, but it’s the only 3-day Chag we ever have.
that’s right! and sheitlach get greasy and frizzy and gross also. machine-washable cotton shmatas FTW (and in israel you get to wear them on yom tov and to work and everywhere)!
ASDF, I wear tichels and hats here in Memphis and I love em.
ASDF, I’m typing this in my New York office, working for a small company that wasn’t even really aware of Shabbos before I came aboard, while wearing a two-scarf combo. I wear a sheitel on the very rare client-facing day, and that’s it. You don’t have to live in Israel to wear a scarf to work.
I decided my deadline for marriage is the next “3 day yom tov”, not realizing that the next one is just 1 year from now (I live in Israel). Yikes! I need to find a husband! OK, I’ll panic in 7 months.
GilaB, i know. i did it in the states also. except that time i wore your sheitel. and your tichels are a lot nicer than mine 😉