DAYS OF DRAMA: "Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific!"

Teenage Angst in the Seventies

I keep thinking about a shampoo called “Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific”. Yes, I know, it’s ridiculous, especially considering it’s a shampoo I’ve never even used because, as far as I know, you could only buy it in America, and I’ve always lived in Switzerland. Plus, it appears to have been discontinued in the 1980s. It’s on my mind because a friend recently gave me a book of advertisement compilations from the 1970s (“70s Fashion”, published by Taschen. Some of the ads are REALLY funny!), and it’s featured in there.

I was a bit bummed Taschen hadn’t included the advert for a perfume called “Wind Song”, because that’s another one I’ve never forgotten - in fact I still remember the catch phrase for it: “I can’t seem to forget you; your Wind Song stays on my mind”. And although the photograph was all wistful and romantic, it conjured up a totally different kind of atmosphere if you had a penchant for poopy jokes like we did in my family.

Anyway, the last time I saw “Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific” advertised was probably 1975, while flicking through the pages of a copy of Seventeen magazine that I’d pinched from one of the cool American girls who’d forgotten it in the senior lounge, located on the right-hand side of the hallway just after the main entrance to the school cafeteria. There was a jukebox in the senior lounge of the International School of Geneva (aka Ecolint), and lots of big bean-bag type cushions to flop around on if you were lucky enough to get a spot. The cool boys played Aerosmith’s “Dream On” a lot. And now that I’ve remembered that nugget of information, I’m going to have the screechy part of the song stuck in my head all day.

There were a lot of Americans in my school back then, and they had all the best stuff. Back then everyone was obsessed with America; everything in the US seemed better, bigger, more advanced, and, well, just way cooler than what we had in Europe, be it music, television, movies, cars, candy, cosmetics.

Also, so many of my American classmates seemed far more confident, far more outspoken than most of the rest of us. I always felt rather intimidated by the groups of gum-chomping girls with flicked out hair and twangy accents who flounced around the campus, elbows linked, commanding right of way. In the warmer months they’d go and stretch out on the grass on the slope that led down to the football field, all gossipy and giggly, tossing their hair and flirting with boys. In class, they flirted with some of the younger teachers, too!

I watched them, those gorgeous shiny girls with quick, albeit sometimes acerbic repartee, who seemed to have opinions on everything and inspired an odd cocktail of curiosity, admiration, jealousy and apprehension. They chattered about cheerleading and shopping malls and drive-ins and McDonalds. They had subscriptions to Seventeen magazine, quoted fun lines from sitcoms that had never made it across the Atlantic. They’d watched films on intercontinental flights and seen all the Hollywood blockbusters during summer holidays in Los Angeles, or San Francisco, or New York, or Boston, or Florida.

How could girls like me compete? Those girls had Noxzema and Revlon and Bonne Bell and Coty on their bathroom shelves, while I just had Clearasil and spots. They used Coppertone fake tan and displayed remarkable orange legs during sports classes, not white mottled pasty pins like me. Also, they nabbed all the cute boys simply because they had shampoos called “Short and Sassy”, or “Long and Silky”, and – obviously – “Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific”. All I had was Dop.

Nevertheless, I tried. I spent my pocket money on Maybelline mascara and Cover Girl lip-gloss and Rimmel foundation. I borrowed my mother’s curling iron and spent hours trying to master that characteristic outward flick. I begged my mother to buy me Levi’s, and Adidas Rom, and cowboy boots, and black clogs. I even persuaded my father to ask one of his American colleagues to order me a jacket I’d spotted in the Sears catalog during a sleepover at a friend’s house. It was fleece-lined denim, guaranteed to boost my popularity tenfold. That jacket, worn with my navy-blue flared corduroy Levi’s, my Smiley Face tee-shirt and my Adidas Rom, was certain to have me in the arms of gorgeous Chip Buddhi within the first few mournful notes of “Angie” at the next school dance.

Sadly, there was some sort of mix-up with the fleece-lined denim jacket. Instead, Sears sent me a padded bright purple waterproof monstrosity with multicolored embroidery down the front, and a hood edged with black and white fake fur. The one time my parents forced me to wear it to school I removed it the second my father had dropped me off and hid it in my locker, preferring to freeze than commit social suicide.

Chip Buddhi probably still doesn’t know I exist, although according to his profile picture on LinkedIn he’s now bald and somewhat slimy looking, so I’m not that fussed. Looking back, I suppose it’s hardly surprising because, when the bell went at breaktime, he was always the first on his feet, out of class, down the stairs and across the courtyard, eager to flesh out his chiseled cheeks with American candy on the two days a week the tuck shop was open.

In those days, before the Sugar Police existed, Ecolint had a small shop called The Green Window that sold Love Hearts, Hershey Bars, Laffy Taffys, Gobstoppers, Tootsie Rolls, and a particularly vile looking spaghetti-like red liquorice. Where did this regular supply of tooth-wrecking booty come from? I can’t be sure, but I’m guessing it was flown in by parents who often went back to the US for business. I never braved the US candy queue; it was far too rowdy for me. Instead, I usually enjoyed a raisin bun in a quiet corner of the cafeteria with the less cool kids, and to this day remain clueless on the merits of Laffy Taffys and Gobstoppers.

I did, however, have an American boyfriend in 11^th grade, but he was quite shy. Gobstoppers weren’t his thing; he much preferred raisin buns and pains au chocolat. He was extremely cute, and tall and slim, with silver-blonde wavy hair, golden skin and big blue eyes, and he always smelled amazing. He wore nice clothes, too, and I especially remember his gorgeous tan suede waistcoat that looked fantastic with white shirts and faded jeans. He also had an off-white Catalina jacket which, according to my friend Bettina, was all the rage in Norway. Best of all though, he was really, really nice!

It's funny how, one way or another, all these memories are linked to that advert for “Gee, Your Hair Smells Terrific”, which has been been stuck in my mind since puberty. I even included it in a scene in my romantic comedy, “Just Like a Movie”!

Seeing it again in the Taschen book took me straight back to those days of drama in high school, when I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who believed that having the right shampoo, and mastering the outward flick would turn my life into a Hallmark movie.

Just Like a Movie

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