Thankfully Hair Grows Back

I finally gave in and went to a hair salon here in SmallTown. I was terribly afraid because I have seen women's hair in this town and well, mullets, that was a fad gone bad. Okay okay so things aren't really as bad as all that. I'm just a big city snob.

I've been waiting until I go back to BigCity, Canada to see my old hairstylist, KnowsMyHair. But I just can't see anymore under this big mop of black hair. And my bangs are out of control. So I bit the bullet and found a woman at work whose hair was mostly okay and she suggested this place. She said this was the only real salon in SmallTown. When she said that, a shiver went down my spine.

I entered the salon trepidaciously, my fingers constantly finding their way to my long black hair. The salon itself felt like the living room of someone's house, a house probably inherited from grandma. It had weird pastel colours and frilly curtains, with cutsie side tables placed around the different rooms and (help!) country music playing in the background.

One of the hairstylists had two dogs that apparently go with her everywhere including the salon (can this place really be called a salon if there are dogs?). And the customer sitting in her styling chair, had her kids playing off to one corner. Here, most of the salons have little playing areas for kids. Dogs and kids. I like them both, but I don't really want them to be part of my spa experience. I like a salon with a quiet atmosphere, a place that wafts with the smell of apricot and coconut shampoo, not dogpiss and cheap perfume.

(Snob.)

My hairstylist was in the back room. She was a beautiful blonde woman in her early fifties. She was dressed like a small town hairstylist with the acid wash jeans and a frightening shirt, which was a mess of different colours. I thought this is what Madonna would look like if she didn't have access to all that Hollywood bling.

We talked about how I didn't want her to alter the length but really just clean it up and cut my bangs. I showed her a picture of me with the haircut I like on myself and what I wanted her to do. She waved her long manicured fingernails pointing me to the hair washing station and I thought I caught a glimpse of red nail polish in the air. I sat down. Scared for my scalp.

In BigCity, Canada, they provided you with gowns so that hair wouldn't get trapped in your clothes and itch all day long. Then KnowsMyHair would always gives me this wonderful scalp massage with an incredible smelling shampoo. Coconut.

(Sigh.)

Here the hair wash was functional. No gown. And thank god it was short, my scalp hurt from her nails. We walked over to the styling chair, I sat down and she pulled out the scissors and comb. Then I took off my glasses.

(Gulp.)

This is the scariest point for me because without them I am legally blind. I can't see anything without them. No exaggeration. So I put my glasses on again and tried to be explicit when I told her I didn't want too much length taken off. She suggested an inch and I thought, that sounds reasonable. I think she knew I was uneasy because she complimented me on my hair,

"I have never seen such perfect black hair. Usually even kids have at least one or two gray hairs."

"Umm, thanks."

I don't colour my hair, but I didn't tell her that I found a couple of gray hairs two years ago and yanked those babies out. Forget about growing old gracefully. HippieHusband can be the one to grow the grays.

"Don't worry, I'll only take off an inch. A hairstylist' inch,"

winking at me as she widened the gap between her thumb and index finger. So much for relaxing. I took the glasses off again.

During the hair cut, she talked, really she shouted, to all manner of people in the "salon" like the other stylist, the contractor and me. I learned that she was twice divorced, no kids. She was trained in a VeryUpScaleSalon somewhere on the coast, but moved to somewhere IntheMidWest when she got married. After her first divorce, she remarried a man from here and moved to SmallTown somewhere in the Pacific NorthWest. Her first sister had trouble getting pregnant so she took all these drugs to help but they didn't work so she went off of them and dang then she got pregnant. Her second sister also had trouble but eventually got pregnant. She's okay with not having kids, mostly. Every two years she goes back to somewhere on the coast to visit her sisters and their kids. But dang she can only take so much of her family. For 7 years, she owned the salon and then sold it after her second divorce because she had no head for business. She continued to work here but then dang it all it was sold to another woman, who she does not at all get along with. Now after 13 years, she has decided to leave and move elsewhere.

(Dang.)

"Well, honey what do you think?"

I put my glasses back on and the world came into focus again. I looked up and into the mirror. Well, I thought, thankfully hair grows back. I paid the hairstylist and walked out.

The page boy haircut worked for the beatles, right? Maybe it'll work for me?