I am not blessed with good hair.

When I was 16, I received my first love letter. My poetic friend described in great detail his affection for my spirit, his attraction to my personality and his adoration of my physical features. He described my eyes as a kaleidoscope of light, my smile as a ray of sun and my hair as... my hair as... Well, he called it horsehair.

Can you feel it — the encumbered strain of being dealt an impossible task, the forehead vein popping in exasperation at not being able to find something more complimentary to equate to the protein growing out of my scalp than an equine resemblance, the frantic grasping at literary straws? (Coincidentally, straw would be another appropriate way to describe my locks.) Poor guy. I read that line and I smiled. Because it's true — so very true. I have horsehair.

Perhaps I should be pleased to have hair at all. My family still likes to poke fun at the fact that I didn't grow hair until I was nearly 3. I was so old when I got my first haircut that I remember my first snip.

She may be only 10 months old, but my daughter seems to be born with the same lack of locks, nary a hair in sight.

My woes carried on as I grew and my hair, well, didn't. Despite its similar texture to My Little Pony toys, my mane remained shoulder-length. For years, I was told on a weekly basis that I looked "just like Winnie Cooper from 'The Wonder Years' — except for the hair." Who is Winnie without her amazing hair?! She might as well be Sammy from "Sideways Stories from Wayside School," who always wore raincoats and, when forced to remove his many layers of waterproof fabric, turned out to be a dead rat in search of a postmortem education.

In college, the horsehair began turning gray. Sun-In and lemon juice made way for highlights and box colors. I tried to convince myself that this was par for the horse, er, course. Why do you think Emerald City had a horse of a different color? That steed was in need of some gray cover-ups.

After the babies came, my hair fell out. That's one of the many "beautiful" parts of pregnancy no one really tells you about. Tiny bangs grew back in to fill the bald spots — thick wisps of hair that point no direction other than up. Straight up.

Recently, I began highlighting my hair with pinks and purples to hide the grays and distract from the forehead fringe mohawk. My horsehair and I seemed to have finally co-signed a peace treaty. It would never be Winnie Cooper hair; it's more akin to Whinny Cooper. But despite its lack of tress perfection, this horse was finally having her neigh, er, day.

Then we moved.

The humidity will be good for your skin, they said. It will remove toxins, they said. Funny how no one mentioned what it would do to my hair! Oh, wait. Not funny. Coiffure cruelty is what it is.

I have had to remove three masses of matted knots so large that when I came out of the shower, my husband asked whether I had gotten a haircut. Yes. Yes, I did. Only this one was lopsided and choppy — and not in that cool intentionally unintentional hipster way. This had more of a 2-year-old cutting her bangs with kiddie scissors vibe. In this suffocating humidity, I have tried wearing my hair up. I've worn it down. I've worn a bandana. I've washed it every day for a while. I've washed it no days for a while. I've lathered my locks in nothing but coconut oil, the venom of a platypus and love. Perhaps I need to just keep it in a set of curlers and walk around like Mrs. Roper. She did have an excellent robe collection. I could get used to that.

It's time to tame the mane. Do I shave it all off? Do I dread it? Do I braid it? Do I weave it into a bowl for my flying friends to use as a birdbath? Perhaps I embrace the matting and stick flowers into the thick bed of strawlike strands.

WWMED? What would Mr. Ed do?

Katiedid Langrock is author of the book "Stop Farting in the Pyramids," available at http://www.creators.com/books/stop-farting-in-the-pyramids. Like Katiedid Langrock on Facebook, at http://www.facebook.com/katiedidhumor. To find out more about her and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.