This is Beth. I love Denver. I love love living where I live. I have a humongous (possibly out of proportion) sense of pride having been born in Denver.

The connection I have to my city – and, well, the whole damn state of Colorado – has nothing to do with my do. Or does it?

Liz and I are both from Denver. That means we came into the world and spent our child-through-young-adult-hoods (until college for both of us) in a very dry climate. We both, by the way, have naturally curly hair.

As a youngster I recall having hair-related issues while traveling. Eventually, on this very blog, you may see evidence of humidity-induced bad hair days from around the country and world. Don’t hold your breadth, those pics have to be physically removed from photo albums and scanned. It’s not that I’m ashamed of how crazy my do looked on those trips though. Actually, again, I’m proud. And others feel the same way. Check out Reason to Love Denver #22 by Lindsey B. Koehler in 5280 December 2012: http://www.5280.com/magazine/2012/12/reasons-love-denver (to get directly to #22 click to page 4, though I recommend reading other rockin’ reasons as well).

But, don’t move to Colorado. While in many ways we’re happy to share the dry air with frizzy-haired friends, we’re already sharing with more folks than ever before. Already we’re dealing with problems of too many people, particularly in Our Mountains. The impacts go way way beyond hair. As Colorado becomes increasingly hotter and drier, what choices will we make?

It’s not too early to plan a visit to the History Colorado Center to explore real (way beyond hair) climate-related issues. Living West opens November 2013. And meanwhile, tour the exhibits already on display – including Denver A to Z, a love letter to my city. And, hell, go on up to Our Mountains, I hear the snow’s great. (Well…)

*THANKS to Michelle Jeske for sending link to article. Thank you to HCC for allowing us to think about the health of our state in way-more-important-than-hair ways; and to SMM, Jeff Hayward, and Janet Kamien for helping us do it.