Lynette Renee Speed Talks Nailz Passion

I have been intrigued and fascinated by long nails since I was a little girl. My grandmother was my first experience of seeing a woman with long polished nails. She was a self-taught “beautician” that used her long nails to help while curling hair with hot irons. Miss Gwen took pride in her nails, carefully maintaining them and changing the polish every few days. She had an advantage of owning many bottles of nail polish because she sold Avon products to supplement her many income streams. I didn’t know that babysitting, doing hair on the weekends, selling Avon and Sunday dinners were called multiple income streams. To me, it just meant she did what was necessary to provide for her family and have pretty nails.

As a child, I was a nail biter until my fourth grade teacher embarrassed me and said I’d never get a husband because I didn’t have pretty hands to make biscuits! I didn’t care about making biscuits, but I wanted a husband. I stopped biting my nails in sixth grade and started “borrowing” Miss Gwen’s nail polish. By the time I was in high school, I started babysitting on weekends so I had money to buy nail polish and shoes.

I was enamored with red nails for some reason. My mom didn’t allow me to have red nails because they were for ladies of the evening and hussies. It didn’t matter to me that labels were placed on ladies with long red nails, I loved red nails! I was so in love with shiny polished nails that I changed my polish while in labor with my second daughter. I remember hearing the nurses talk about my long red nails as I gave birth. Before the nurse brought my newborn baby to me, she brought nail clippers and told me to cut my nails off so I wouldn’t scratch the baby. After a few choice words, she took the nail clippers away and brought my baby for nursing.

Fast forward 50 years. I have used various products and nail designs to lengthen and maintain my

nails. And, of course, I have been asked how I can do anything with long nails. Ahh...I learned to type, play the piano, make biscuits and anything else I needed to do. Long nails have been such a part of my life that I’ve just adapted to them. I can’t imagine not having long glamour nails!

Both my daughters have seen me maintain long nails, and for many years they have had long beautifully manicured nails too. Long red nails have now become generational in my family because now my granddaughter has long nails! Miss Gwen would be proud.