“Bootylicious”

One thing that I think that men, no matter how much they try will never truly understand is the trauma of getting their hair cut. Mostly because 1) men don’t tend to grow their hair as long as women do and 2) there generally isn’t too much change in men’s hair styles.

I generally get my hair cut about once a year…or more because I just can’t be arsed to pay for trims and to sit around for a trim to be done. Which of course means by the time that I give in and cut my hair, it’s really log and the ends are pretty bad. Which adds to the bits of hair anxiety as I wait in the chair as the hair stylist (?) gets everything just so, so they can cut my hair. I don’t ask generally too much when I get my hair cut, even in the back, not look like a three-year-old with a bushwhacker cut my hair, really not too much in my opinion…

However it seems like every time I get my hair cut, I’m always almost or definitely in tears. The worst was when I was in Morocco, a Korean women from my parish offered to cut my hair and I figured that since Korean women in generally are pretty stylish, etc. And she was a beautician back in Korea everything would be wonderful. My hair was down to the small of my back, I had wanted my hair to be about shoulder length to help combat the summer heat. The first cut left my hair jagged, uneven, but shoulder length. When I mentioned that my hair was uneven, she looked and finally noticed that my shoulders are uneven, so she cut more off to correct it. My hear was now just below my ears and crooked the other way (my jaw is crooked the opposite way of my shoulders). So after the third and thankfully final cut my hair was about an inch long and I looked like a boy. I cried for a while. Yes my hair would eventually grow out and I would eventually not look like a boy but the shock and how bad it was to look in the mirror and see myself with very little hair was hard to take in.

This time was a bit different after the amount I was going to donate to Locks of Love was cut off, I was persuaded to get a long bob. Apparently bobs look good on people with oval faces. The back was supposed to be just above shoulder length and the front longer. The woman who originally was cutting my hair was told in English (by me) and in Spanish (by her co-worker) what I wanted. Just barely shoulder-length in the back, layered, longer in the front. So she’s cutting and cutting, adding another two inches or so to the floor, I thinking that she’s almost done when she stops and asks me do I want layers or do I just want it to be simply straight across? I look in the mirror and have a panic attack. The other woman looks at my hair and my face, shops the other woman away and tells me that she’ll fix it. Which happily she did, minor crisis avoided, yeay!