Hair hath no fury like a woman shorn

Being one of the curly-haired flock, I have never been a big fan of haircuts.  My apprehension with the whole hair-styling enterprise is directly proportional to the enthusiasm of the person with the scissors, because 26 years of experience has demonstrated that the more excited a stylist is about chopping up my halo, the less likely they are to do it well.

What will likely end up happening is that, after being pinned in an elevated chair under a plastic sheet grimacing much like a corpse in a body bag, I will experience any or all of the following:

• LAYERS.
• The stylist saying "Hmmmmmmm....", which means she cut off waaaay too much somewhere, forgetting that it will rebound the second she lets go.
• MORE LAYERS.
• "Oh, this is gonna look like the best perm ever!"
• "You really frizz up, huh?"
• "I'm just gonna layer it in the back."
• "So, you'll need this product, and this product, and this product, and this product..."
• "You always blow it dry straight, right?"
• "Where do you part your hair?"
• "Huh.  Look at that.  It'll grow out."
• "Straight hair doesn't do THAT."

And then I pay my money and go home and cry.  I avoid looking in the mirror for the next six months as I try to figure out what possessed that reasonable-looking stylist with the impressive pedigree to give me a she-mullet.  I stare enviously at my friends who can change hairstyles without having to plan two summers ahead, and who don't gain six inches of height when it rains.  They own things like brushes and combs and actually use them, smelling like finesse and aplomb and all sorts of other showy isms as I glower in a corner dwarfed by my fuzzy nimbus.

"Too bad about your hair", they say, flicking a streaming mane of chestnut silk over a shoulder.  "You should try my guy - he's fabulous."

And then it just starts all over again.

It's been this way ever since I was a kid, when I demanded that my mother take me to Simpsons for a pixie cut in the vain hope that stripping myself of my ringlets would end the ubiquitous comparisons to Shirley Temple and the incessant parade of vague parental acquaintances lining up to pinch my cheek.   It didn' t  work - I was still pinched regularly by odd people as if grabbing the tender flesh of a child's face is an appropriate way to express fondness.  But I digress.  The whole point was THAT was when I started cutting my hair regularly in the first place, beginning the chain of hell that ended with my copying of the haircut that almost ended Keri Russell's career:

It was SHORT.  And it was WRONG. 

And it's been growing out ever since.  The nightmares stopped in late 2003, but the damage caused by that ill-advised hair choice lasted lasted almost two years, until this week I finally squirrelled up enough courage to go and have a much-needed cut.

But instead of going to some psychopathic scissor-wielding curl butcher, I went here.  And lo, it was beautiful.  THEY CUT MY HAIR CURL BY CURL, and gave me the BEST PRODUCT EVER TO CONTROL FRIZZ.   There was no "ooops".  There were no layers.  Shirley Temple was nowhere to be found.

This time I cried tears of joy.  The best part was, there's a twenty percent discount if you come during a weekday and pay cash.

Hell, after a lifetime of mullets, poodle cuts and sheared lamb 'dos, I'd pay them in blood if they asked. 

Comments

[Mr. Kong]

I sympathize.
I think I'd prefer my curly hair to straight hair, though.
Straight hair is for uglies.

[Steph]

As a hair-cut addict (mines fine and straight and flies around a bunch) I'm glad you found something that works for you.

I've had many a Toni perm (and late night trips to the salon with a kerchief on my head due to my mother's experiments) so I can sympathize with the not looking like the picture.

Though I think Keri Russell looked hot with the short hair.

[Anne]

Congratulations! When I first met someone who wanted to cut my hair dry, curl by curl, it changed my life.