HERVOICE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010 ■ 23

KARYN STEFFEN, Nationally Certified Licensed Massage

“”It is a great honor and blessing to have the opportunity to help so many people find healing from t heir pain. ”

Nationally Certified Licensed Massage Therapist

I believe massage therapy involves much more than an hour of relaxation. A deep relaxing massage

improves health, both physically and mentally, by relieving painful muscle tension and stress that s aps

energy. Being a massage therapist is the most rewarding career choice I ever made!

I’ve been a massage therapist for 4 1/2 years. I obtained a Degree in Therapeutic Massage from Nati onal

American University in August 2005 and become a Nationally Board Certified Licensed Massage Therapis t

in February 2006. I have taken many continuing education classes to learn new techniques to keep my

massages beneficial for my clients. Client care and healing results are my most important goals.

I’d like to say “Thank You” to all my loyal and faithful clients who have made my business such a su ccess.

Located at Riverfront Place, 115 Broadway Ave., Suite #6, Yankton • 605-260-0100

Healing Hands Massage Therapy

I was looking through some old photo-graphs the other day. The one thing Inoticed, other than the fact that I used to becuter… and thinner… was that the hairstylesthat were “in” when I was “in” are so…“out” now.

In fact, the more pictures I looked at, themore I realized that nearly every woman myage has gone through the same phases ofhairstyles that I did.

As a baby, you had those wispy little curlsof hair that your daughter had: Those sweetlittle ringlets of hair that you never wantedto cut.

However, at some point your brother gothold of a pair of scissors and played barber-shop with your hair. That’s how you endedup with the bangs you always despised.

From about 4th or 5th grade you decidednot to put up with those bangs any longer.They made you look childish. No matterthat you were, in fact, still a child. By thetime those bangs grew out you wouldn’t bea child any longer, you thought.

So middle school was a hair nightmare ofbarrettes, head bands, scrunchies and stylesthat would hide how hideous you lookedbecause you were trying to grow out thosebangs. You knew, though, that once theygrew out, your braces came off, and yousprouted some breasts, you’d look like asuper model.

Except that, by that time, the styleswould change again and you were supposedto look like Farrah Fawcett and Cheryl Tiegs

– not Twiggy.Well, heck. Now you have to cut your

hair in layers and learn how to use a curlingiron. If you look closely, in your high schoolyear book, you are bound to see at least onegirl who had to get her picture taken with acurling iron burn on the side of her face.Maybe it was you.

After they started filling emergencyrooms with embarrassing curling iron inci-dents, celebrities, in a rare moment of soli-darity, decided to ditch the curling iron andembrace the curly perm. When the curlyperm grew out, the shag hairstyle was born.

The shag only lasted until the layers grewout in the back and what was left was theinfamous hairstyle called the mullet. Shorton top, long in the back, no curls, no main-tenance. The mullet tried to incorporateevery hairstyle to date and failed miserably.It really only looked good on Billy RayCyrus. Of course, Billy Ray Cyrus wouldhave looked good bald. Who was looking athis hair, anyway?

At some point, shortly after the mulletbecame popular, someone - some influentialsomeone - actually looked at themselves in amirror, from the side, and said, “Oh…no.”And the mullet was dead.

Here’s where everything gets a little fuzzy.This is perhaps the time when women of myage decided to find a hairstyle that lookedgood on them individually. There was a lotof guesswork. A lot of walking out of a hairsalon having paid a good tip for a style that

you were sure you’d grow to adore, butwhen you arrived home, your husbandinvariably looked at you as if a Muppet hademerged from your scalp. It was everywoman for herself.

You experimented with past styles. Youlet the hairdresser talk you out of a bodywave and turn your head into a Brillo pad inan effort to show you that, with her expen-sive products, you can look like you have abody wave without actually getting one.

You cut it short. You grow it long. Youtry a rainbow of different shades of haircolor. You gel it, spike it, tease it, and tossit.

Finally, you realize that it doesn’t matterwhat you do with your hair, you are nevergoing to look like a super model because therest of your body is not cooperating.

Then you do what many older womenhave done: You tell the hairdresser to cut itall off so you don’t have to mess with it any-more. This will make it abundantly clear toanyone who cares to question your decision,that you are not trying to look like a supermodel, you are merely being practical.

EDITORIAL

LLaauurraaOOnn LLiiffee Hair Today & Yesterday

■ by Laura SnyderYou can reach Laura at lsnyder@lauraonlife.com

or visit her website www.lauraonlife.com for morecolumns and info about her new book.