I got my haircut yesterday afternoon. First time since February.
I’m a nervous Nelly when it comes to haircuts. I chalk it up to years of awful stylists growing up. And I’ve the school photos to prove it.
Thank you Mum and Dad for giving my brothers ammo to use when I invited my new boyfriend over to dinner with the family.
Take that traumatic syndrome and mix it with a pandemic AND the fact that it has almost 5 months since I was last under the scissors … I had a down right pulse popping out of my neck. Saving grace is that my neck was concealed by a fancy face covering.
But it doesn’t stop there. I also have an unnatural fear when it comes to the social element of salons.
I’m a no muss kind of girl. I have always told people: Take everything you know about what you think it means to be a girl … and toss all of that nonsense out the window … with the exception of spiders and my excessive need for bottles on the vanity and post-shower bathroom me-time.
My girlie guidance works of most. Except in salons. In salons, people who work there either don’t believe me or think they can style their way to “fix” my “glitch.”
It’s the only place, save the dentist, where I feel like a mouse. I’m 5’4″- challenged to begin with, but when I’m at those places, I can barely see over the waiting room coffee table.
But I try.
With firm posture I walk into hair cutting establishments with clean damp hair and confidently explain that all I want is to leave with properly shorn damp hair not anything above shoulder length.
My directive is usually met with a parental smile as I am gingerly placed under a thin robe and seated with my chair lifted off the ground so my legs swing like a child on a swing in a playground.
High up and snapped in, trapped if I may be so bold, thus is followed by multiple discussions about the benefits and beauty of colouring my hair, about having my eyebrows modernised, if I’ve ever considered bangs, how I’d feel about spiky hair ends during a blow out. Oh, and my favourite … wouldn’t a pixie cut be cute?
In the hair cutting world, there’s an unspoken motto: Never too much, only too little.
- I like my honey brown auburn hair.
- There’s nothing wrong with my eyebrows.
- Yes, when I was five.
- Um, Google Translate anyone?
- Are you f**king kidding me? Look at the size of my forehead!
Ah, I almost forgot Number 6 … which is: No thank you, not today, I won’t be needing your $45 bottle of shampoo accompanied with a discount for the conditioner at $23.99.
C’mon, do the math and the product up sell is double what I pay with tip for the actual cut.
To be fair, 99.9% of my jaunts to my local salon works well for all parties involved, and the stuff I mention above ends up being filler conversation whilst the stylist tidies my hay-head mop. 5 minutes in, and I’m all good. And yesterday was no exception, just slightly different.
I booked an appointment in advance (not the norm for where I go). Two customers inside at all times. Everyone waits outside. Masks on when in the chair. Simple and uncomplicated, and not in the least stressful.
My appointment was at 3 pm. I was done by 3:12 with 2 inches off my hair and a comfortable feeling of being a lesser “me” than when I first walked in.
Not a bad cut either. An improvement over the last few months of growing unruliness, if I may say so myself. I said “thank you” three times to my new bestie Chantel as I was leaving. And I meant every one word of it. Pre-COVID, I may have even given Chantel a hug.
If this is a trend, I’ll literally rinse and repeat in December.
Happy Tuesday.