Bangs and Brooks & Dunn

For a good portion of my life, I had bangs. Permed bangs. Poofy bangs. Bangs curled up. Bangs curled down. Stiff bangs. Straight bangs.

You get the idea.

Sometimes they were cute, like when I was really young and missing key teeth.


Once I got to that awkward middle school stage of my life, the bangs got a bit more awkward too. Of course, the giant glasses didn't really up my coolness quotient at all.


But, as you can see, even My Mom sported sweet bangs. It was just how things were done back then.

Also, apparently back then we only wore Hard Rock Cafe t-shirts.

Then, as was the trend at the time, the summer before I entered 9th grade I grew my bangs out. I've had a few whisps across the forehead at different points since then, but for the most part since my freshman year of high school I've been a no bangs girl.

Last Friday, though, when I went for a hair cut, I got an itch. I decided I needed to do something different, to change things up a bit. To hide my giant forehead.

And so I got brave and asked for bangs again.

These bangs, to be exact.


(And no, that is not me. Although naturally I'm almost as hot. But my makeup artist has the day off and so I had to substitute this photo in place of a real one of me.)

So far, I'm a fan. Although I keep brushing them to the side because it feels like they don't belong on my forehead. Still, it's a fun change.

And the timing couldn't be more perfect, because on Saturday we went to a Brooks & Dunn concert.

Now I know what you're thinking. I believe it goes a little something like this:

Julie, what the heck do Brooks & Dunn have to do with bangs?

Come on people. They have everything to do with bangs.

But let me be a bit more explicit.

In the height of my bangs-wearing, in what My Mom and I are estimating was around fourth grade, I attended my first real, big, live concert.

And it was Brooks & Dunn at the county fair in Lewistown, Montana, where My Mom was born and raised.

We often went up to visit Grandpa Charlie and Grandma Barb in the summer, and when we were lucky our visits coincided with the fair—think the usual variety of rides and fair food and, of course, a rodeo or two.

And so, that fateful fair year, I went to my very first concert. It was the tour where Brooks wore that red flamed western shirt, in case you're up on these things. (Consequently, some fellow actually was wearing that shirt last Saturday night. Perhaps it, too, is coming back in style?)

It was the year of Boot Scootin' Boogie and all those classics that a good portion of the people at Saturday night's concert didn't really know.

Boy oh boy, last weekend's concert took me back.

I even bought a t-shirt from my very first concert. And somewhere, in some photo album, there is a photo of me in that t-shirt from that trip. And there's one thing My Mom and I remember for certain. In that photo I have bangs. And big glasses. And a perm.

We can both picture it as clearly as if it were last Saturday.

And that is why bangs and Brooks & Dunn go together.