Fact: Italian’s are naturally more hairy compared to other ethnicities.

* This is not a proven fact so do not quote me for your next “The History of the Abundance of Hair, Cultures of Other Civilizations, Other than America’s, have Upon their Bodies” essay

In Florence I have begun to turn into a true Italian, but not because of my language, or the way I dress, or the color nail polish I wear. I still scream American when you see me walking down the street singing to Dragonette (a musician) while smiling to everyone. But if you look closer, you can see the change.

This change is found in my eyebrows.

As surprising as this may sound, my Italian adjustment is evident in my eyebrows. They are growing as fast as an antelope being chased by a cheetah. Although cheetahs are fast, the antelope still surprises them and make the fierce animal work for its winning prize. I use this metaphor to describe the hairs and the tweezers I have to use, to attack them every day in order to find the “used to be perfect shape” of my eyebrow. In Salt Lake City I do my eyebrows every once in a while, cleaning them up. You know, the usual monthly primping.

 I have been in Italy for twenty days and I have plucked more hairs from above my eyes than I have my entire life.

I guess I should not complain. People thrive for large, bushy, lushes eyebrows. Old women, whose jobs are to serve crappy food to students in elementary school at noon every day, loose theirs and paint them back on thick and full (sure, they are a neon purple color, but some people just like a little color on their face.)

I do not know what is making them grow so fast and so frequent.

I am guessing it is the air. The scent of vineyards, basil, pee, and Vespa exhaust, must have some hair hormone growth power that not even Al Gore (the knower of all things pollution and internet) could make a movie about or promote in a failed presidential campaign.

 We could blame it on the pasta I have been eating or maybe all the fresh fruit, meats, and cheeses. It would make some sense, considering that all the products used to preserve or enhance our groceries back home would be removed, there for eliminating the plastic clogging my skin pours. (This would also be a superb explanation for my new development of zits, on my usually completely clear and smooth face.)

Nevertheless, my eyebrows are sprouting like weeds on my Mother’s front lawn in Salt Lake: full in abundance.

I pluck them every morning. It is like one of those nightmares where the day just keeps repeating. I wake up, brush my teeth, wash my face with my bursting beads cleanser, look in the mirror and say “good morning beautiful,” scream because I think I have caterpillars on my forehead, turn on the high power light, stare into the magnifying mirror, and rip hundreds of long, dark, thick, hairs from my pours striving to remove the fresh uni-brow from between my eyes.

Oh, don’t you even get me started on my armpits.