Women shouldn’t dive into debt to finance frilly fingernails

Dear readers,

I am going to explain to you today why our beloved country is in debt up to its eyebrows and without anyone being able to see a way out, other than austerity forever. The old chorus dancer knows.

Bet you didn't know that back in ancient Rome, in the days of Julius Caesar, only male citizens of Rome, not women or foreigners, were allowed to wear togas. Therefore, to wear one was a mark of honor. The color of the toga's border indicated the citizen's rank. It was most often purple/magenta.

However, prostitutes were required by law to wear gray togas and were also forbidden to cut their nails or hair (source: Historic Costume for the Stage, Lucille Barton, Ph.D. Miss Lucy was my professor of costume in the University of Texas Drama Department and was an incredible researcher.) I would gather that this was the origin of sexy associated with long nails and hair, don't you think?

Women of today still spend lots of money and time on their nails for exceedingly frivolous reasons. I am totally guilty. However, I did my own manicures and spent my life as an entertainer, so I might be excused. I had to cut my nails short and wear clear polish to play Aunt Eller in "Oklahoma! The Musical." I had to cut them short on the set and do a fast-file procedure when I was hired for a Camay soap commercial.

In the African-American community, we see nails so long they curve back in a circle, sometimes 2 feet and longer. The nails create awe in observers but also give rise to wonderment as to exactly how they tend to their toilette. Maybe they all have bidets? Unfortunately, the vogue for these extra-long nails, in squares or points, painted a few different colors and cost lots extra.

The part that really bothers me is the money spent on manicures that includes rhinestones, hand-painted flowers and waves, stripes or whatever. Very artistic and charming, except wiser heads can't help but think about compound interest involving $35 to $40 or so a month over 50 to 60 years. They'd be millionaires at retirement age if they had invested even $30 a month at interest rates as low as 1 percent.

I keep telling my young friends that the dollar I earned and saved when I was their age is now worth 20 cents and that yes, I used to have long nails because I occasionally worked as a hand model and also wanted to look glamorous when I was young ... but I did them myself.

Mother owned beauty salons in Austin, where I was expected to check in after school. So, to amuse myself, I often used the extra manicure table to give myself a manicure. I wore Chen U's Emerald Green nail polish to school once, and my fourth-grade teacher had a stern word with Mother. Genius is so often squelched. Sigh.

There's more to this, actually: What's graceful or elegant or smart about overly long nails? Nothing at all. My nails are so healthy and strong that it's a nuisance to keep filing them down. They grow out before I know it. Also, I'm in the habit of pushing the cuticles back with a washcloth after a bath or shower, which keeps them growing. Just lucky.

My sister has a perfectly good and sensible reason to get professional manicures. She bites her nails into the quick out of fear that she might not be perfect, but not if she has had a beautiful, protective manicure.

However, I insist that clerks, saleswomen, secretaries, teachers and housewives have no business spending money on fancy fingernails. It seems American women want to be like the women/wives on television, even if it means running credit cards into the ground or facing foreclosure on their homes, all for living beyond their means and having those silly, long, decorated fingernails.

They are irresponsible day dreamers with no hope, not being able to face reality, which must always come first. My generation had to make do or do without, learn to mend and sew, to manicure, to work out by yourself, to cook gourmet food from basic ingredients, to grow big houseplants from little plants, and on and on.

I'm so boring when I'm on my soapbox.

Betty Bunch is a former dancer. Today, she works with the National Elderhostel Association. Contact her at bettybunch100@gmail.com.