Nails?

I've been growing out my fingernails again. It's been a while since I had any length of nail. There are plusses and minuses to having long fingernails. I can't decide whether to keep this set. We'll see what happens.

In my 20s, I had beautiful, manicured nails. I did them myself. It was a Sunday evening ritual. Take off the old polish. File the nails. Push back the cuticles. Apply bottom coat (clear). Apply two layers of polish (usually a shade of red or pink - never went exotic with black or blue). Apply top coat. Try not to touch anything for at least a half hour to let them dry completely. Usually, a good, patient manicure would last for a week. Sometimes less if I was doing some kind of manual labor.

In my 30s, I stopped having long nails. I started doing karate, and long fingernails were no longer practical for a couple of reasons. First, they broke off in class all the time anyway. Second, when you close your first to punch, you can punch a hole in your hand with a long fingernail. Third, you can scratch other people - and they really don't appreciate it! So I started trimming my nails regularly.

I gave up karate around my 40th birthday. And I could have started to grow out my nails again. Instead, I kept them short. If anything, I was more likely to keep them trimmed than not. In many ways, it's just easier. But you still have to deal with cuticles - at least I do. And so I wasn't able to ignore my nails altogether.

About 3-4 years ago, my sister gave my mother and me a nail buffer in our Christmas stockings. I'd never buffed my nails before, but we have a genetic thing that puts ridges in our fingernails. The buffer makes them smooth again. Not to mention shiny. So for the past few years, I've mostly just been dealing with that for my nail care - buffing my nails, pushing back the cuticles, but keeping the nails themselves short.

Then for whatever reason, probably too much work, I just didn't cut them for a while. And then I decided to file the edges rather than cut the nails off. Right now, I have eight long nails and two mostly long but not quite AS long because they have broken off. That's the other challenge of growing out your nails. Unless you use the fake ones, it's a challenge to have 10 long nails at the same time.

And I'd forgotten what it's like to type with long nails. It's definitely a different feeling, and you have to "angle" your hands differently to consciously type more with the pad. Or click, click, click with your nails. I know women who type with their nails, but it doesn't really work for me.

I haven't polished my nails since I've grown them out again. I don't have any polish that isn't at least a year or so old. And I haven't decided whether to commit to keeping them long again or not.

But there is something feminine about having long nails. Or is that just my imagination? I'll have to pay more attention to the women around me and see what percentage of women I know have painted nails and what percentage don't seem to bother. It will be a social experiment. I'll report back in a month or so.