Bad hair

Today, I went to get my hair cut. Apparently, the difference between a good haircut and a bad one is about 3 weeks.  For me it’s been a lot longer than 3 weeks. In fact, I estimate that it’s been nearly a year.  Mea culpa.

I hate going to the hairdresser. I prefer, if the need arises, to go to the dentist. Not that I’m suggesting or inferring that I would let my dentist cut my hair. No, each to his own. I’d just rather sit and make strange noises with my mouth full of ironmongery than have my hair cut, however competent the person wielding the scissors.

The time had come, however, for me to do something about my hair. It was so neglected that I have found myself admiring the hairstyles of itinerants and bag ladies and wondering how they managed to look better coiffed than me. The answer wasn’t difficult.

As a small child, I was “blessed” (according to those who didn’t share my “blessing”) with naturally curly hair. This was all fine when I was too small to care, but later it became the bane of my life. I even recall one visit to the hairdresser during my teenage years where I walked all the way home under an umbrella. It wasn’t even raining.

By the time I reached the age of about 16, however, someone in the world of hairdressing had discovered blow-drying. This was a major breakthrough, as, until that point, the nearest I had ever come to having straight hair was when my (older) second cousin revealed that she ironed her hair, and I decided to give it a try. I was soon to discover that this isn’t a job for one person, and certainly not if that one person has quite short hair. After painfully managing to iron my left arm, I decided that I was doomed to curls. And then came the blow-dry.  At last, armed with the appropriate hairbrush and dryer and a strong will, I could eliminate the curls that had become the bane of my life. Well, until the weather got damp or it rained, at least!

It took a good many more years before I managed to grow my hair to any sort of length, and since then I’ve gone from the sublime to the ridiculous, having buzz-cuts with clippers, or going months without crossing the threshold of a hair salon.

Now that I’m a Woman of a Certain Age, long hair is probably not the best choice, but it keeps me out of the salon for longer. Not only that, but I can wake up in the morning and look in the mirror without recoiling in fright, and I can tie it back in an approximation of a neat chignon and get away with it. Anyway, it’s not exactly long….this time last year I was just post-buzz-cut, so it barely scrapes my shoulders at this point. Or it did this morning.

Given my lack of enjoyment of the whole salon experience, I have to strike when the iron’s hot, and the iron was hot today. I gathered up my courage and drove to the hairdresser. The ends of my hair have, over the last few months, become so dry that I have been a fire hazard, and it could go on no longer. The hairdresser managed not to recoil in horror as I released my hair from the clip, for which I gave her extra points.  She lifted a handful of hair, which, through the very unforgiving mirror in the salon, made me look like my mother with a bale of hay on her head. 

It’s over now…thankfully.  My hair feels wonderfully soft and smooth, as opposed to crispy, and there still appears to be enough left for me to gather it up and tie it back. You’d really think that at my age I’d have got over my fear of hairdressers, but in spite of my assurances, when prompted, that yes, I would have a regular trim every three months, I’m going to have to steel myself for the next time.