Chasing Ancestors in the Beauty Parlor

Dang ya'll.. it's hot up in this holler. Could someone please send Mother Nature a calendar, flipped to September, as a small reminder that it's not supposed to be this farkin' warm?

I need to get out of this house for a little fresh air, but I'm not doing it while snakes are still a'crawlin'.

*shudder*

I'm looking forward to payday next week so that I can go get my hair trimmed. I haven't been since the Willy Wonka ordeal. It's grown out a bit, now my hair resembles that of the itty bitty king in the first Shrek movie.

Oh I'm sexay sexay!

My last visit to Fanstastic Sams Samuele De Fantastique turned out to be enlightening, even if my hair, upon leaving, left a lot to be desired. The stylist didn't look familiar, although she swore she'd been there for years. I was a little uncomfortable with her appearance, she gave the impression that she'd spent her break behind the building, smoking a big fat doobie in the back of a van, listening to the Grateful Dead. Not that there's anything wrong with any of those things, but seriously, I'd rather have someone not be too chemically altered while wielding sharp instruments around my face.

"Whoooaaa.. do you like.. straight iron your hair?" she asked, as she ran her fingers through my unruly mop "No. It's just naturally ram rod straight," I answered, "I used to call it squaw hair, until I realized it wasn't 'p.c.'"

She studied my face in the mirror, still moving my hair around with her fingers, but studying my features, her eyes squinting a little. Then she smiled and a look of satisfaction formed on her lips.
"You're Blackfoot," she stated.

Her statement struck me odd, because although just about everyone in Hee-Haw county has some Native American blood, it's normally assumed that it's Cherokee. This was all their land after all and the Oconaluftee tribe's reservation is about an hour and a half from here. "My great grandmother was full-blooded something, we were always told Cherokee, but a few years ago, one of my uncles was doing some genealogy research and he mentioned that she was more likely to have been Blackfoot. How did you come to that conclusion anyway?" I asked.

"You look like my father," she answered. I wasn't sure how I felt about her explanation. I mean, I already have enough complexes over my cosmetically challenged appearance. My self esteem couldn't handle being told I looked like this droopy eyed, bleached out old hippies' daddy. "He was full blooded Blackfoot Indian. Your cheekbones aren't just high, they're wide set, like his. You have the rounded face of the Blackfoot. Where was your great grandmother from?"

I became so engrossed in the conversation, I stopped paying attention to what the leftover flower child was doing to my head. "She was from Texas, but her parents were from Louisiana and Mississippi."

The stylist smiled and nodded. "Daddy's people were from Louisiana. That's Blackfoot country."

So now, I've decided, I can add Blackfoot to the ever growing list of racial and cultural heritages which make Mahala. I still lay claim to some Cherokee blood as well, which is rumored to be intermingled with the Melungeon line on my father's side. There is also the documented lineage back to the one known 'round these parts as Glumdaclitch, a supposed Cherokee woman who was either a loose moralled tart who had babies with half the white men up in the little mountain community where she lived, or a cunning, resourceful woman of her time who knew what she had to do to survive, depending on who you ask.

I suspect she wasn't Native American at all, but more likely a Melungeon mix, claiming Cherokee blood because back then it was more acceptable than being a Portuguese, Sephardic Jew or Muslim slave. The name Gludaclitch is actually from Gulliver's Travels, yet it shows up on the old census forms.. but I've said all this before haven't I?

Sorry.. I get on a roll and start repeating myself.

Anywho, I'd better go find something productive to do. I've wasted the better part of the day fighting a headache brought on by late summer allergies. It's finally subsided, but now I have to play catch up.

I'll be back tomorrow with news from the Asylum. Ya'll have a good one.

Later Taters!

P.S. That's my Granny in the picture, not my great grandmother.