Singular life
Hair today, gone tomorrow
Petronella Wyatt
It really wouldn't have been the same. That scene in Roman Holiday when princess incognito Audrey Hepburn careers Gregory Peck's Vespa around the sights of Rome. I mean, if she had turned to him and asked, 'Shall I buckle up first?', or he had whispered to her — oh, so lovingly 'Don't forget to put on your crash helmet, darling.'
I mean, she had just been to the hair- dressers, for goodness sake, and had that legendary Hepburn crop. Seduction before road safety. It is Italy after all. My summer holidays, for the past 10 years, have been spent in Porto Ercole, Rome's favoured seaside resort since the time of the Emper- or Augustus, The Vespa was the ultimate pulling instrument — more efficacious than Dolce and Gabbana and considerably cheaper. Renting one of the ice-lolly- coloured motorised bikes cost between £10 and £15 a day. Then, of course, one had to undress for it. The rental garage was orna- mented by pictures of 1960s starlets from Cinecitta astride the leather saddles, wear- ing hot pants, heels so high you got vertigo looking at them and gold bangles the weight of two-ton trucks. But the vital thing, the cynosure of all sighs, was the hair, the capelli, the coiffure. People went to hair salons just to ride their Vespas. Girls rode past with blonde tresses — as genuine as Milanese gigolos — streaming down their backs, Clip-on flowers, ribbons and combs completed the uber-erotic effect. It was like watching Shampoo on speed. We always used to wonder what happened when one of these objects became caught up in the machinery.
But the bella figura took precedence before everything. Thus it was that I found myself swaying stupidly down Italian roads, astride a pink motorino, with a carnation clip perched on top of my head. Of course nothing could have been more irresponsi- ble. Every touch of the accelerator spoke of impending calamity: the roads were lousy, as full of pits as a bad complexion. Every bump promised disaster. The curtain of hair arranged artfully in front of my eyes concealed blank terror. I knew that if I fell — and I did, twice — nothing would cush- ion my brains from being smashed on the gravel. It happened to others; they made lovely corpses, although their maquillage had to be rearranged somewhat in the morgue.
It really was criminal. No one saw those slivers of shiny metal as they popped like corks out of small turnings on to the main road. But I suppose it pulled the men toothless ancients who once resembled Alcibiades but now looked like walking cadavers, sitting playing cards on stone benches and spitting from time to time. Some day my principe may come. Not on top of a bike, he won't.
Last week, when I arrived in town, something had happened. At first there was obfuscation. I couldn't put my finger on it. As Holmes used to say to Dr Wat- son, I saw but I did not observe. Some- thing was missing. Then I noticed what it was. The hair. It wasn't streaming any more. In fact it wasn't there at all. The women on Vespas were suddenly wearing crash helmets — all of them. They looked like atomic ants. Was the Pope a Catholic? The facts were indisputable. In Rome, I gathered, it was the same. Italy had finally passed a law requiring the wearing of crash helmets. What it must have cost them. Henrico, who rents Vespas, was crestfall- en. La dolce vita was finita. vero,' he said, stifling a manly sob. 'There were too many accidenti.' He held aloft a regulation helmet in off-white as if it were a poisoned mushroom. `Terribile.'
Nothing so grim has happened to Italy since Mussolini mucked up the invasion of Abyssinia. They are weeping into the Trevi fountain. Marcello Mastroianni is spinning like strands of tagliatelli. But the Italians being Italians, things won't remain like this for long.
Trussardi, purveyors of leather goods to loaded Latins, has designed a crash helmet made out of python skin. It costs a little over £1,000, but the wallet must suffer so the donna can be beautiful, after all.
`Our PR department opposes this merger — our corporate colours would clash.'
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