My hairdresser left me. True, he was only my stylist for a year, and it was at least 12 years ago that he moved to New York, but the pain is real and I have never really gotten past it and moved on with my life. Oh, I have had other hairdressers since then, some of them reasonably good, but none have made it past the second cut. No one has been able to take the place of Glen. None have had that magical way of delivering the perfect, stylish, maintenance-free haircut that he did.
For the past 12+ years, I have been looking for that perfect hairstyle that will change my life. The problem has been that I won't trust a new hairstylist with a major change, and I haven't stuck with any stylist long enough to trust her. Instead, I put off getting a cut until the situation becomes an emergency, then head off to whomever I managed to find that can cut my hair on a Saturday on short notice, ending up with another mediocre cut.
I am not sure what got into me a couple of weeks ago when I decided to use the occasion of visiting my parents to get a cut at the walk-in place at the local mall. I am also not sure what I was thinking when I asked for a complicated, layered style with bangs (which I haven't had since the hairstylist in Italy who thought he would do the uncultured american a favor and send me home with hair an inch long.) I should have known better when she looked at the picture I showed her and frowned for several seconds. When she said "I'll be right back" and disappeared into the back room for over 5 minutes, I should have run for the hills. I don't know why I have such a hard time trusting my instincts. Instead, I stayed, naively and optimistically believing that what I would get would be somewhat similar to what I had asked for. After all, this woman was trained to cut hair, was she not? How bad could it be?
I will tell you how bad it could be: First, she cut the back of my hair to the correct length, while cutting the front an inch too short on one side and 2 inches too short on the other. Then, instead of soft, blended layers, she cut a thick, blunt, choppy shelf 2/3 of the way around my head. It was a comical, exaggerated, sitcom version of a bad haircut. It looked like a practical joke. And here is the best part: when I went back to complain to the manager, the woman who had cut it came over to defend herself, telling me I had the wrong kind of hair for that style.
After a week of wearing my hair in a ponytail, I finally got up the courage to have it fixed. I tracked down a highly recommended salon and managed to get a next-day appointment. A perfectly nice person named Amber did what she could with what was left of my hair. She managed to blend the layers so I don't look like I had had an accident with farming equipment. She did what she could do even up the sides. She had a lot to work with, and in the end I think it is just going to have to grow out for a couple of month before it will look decent again. So it is back in a pony tail for the forseeable future. Lesson learned - no more mall cuts.
The bangs do look cute, though.
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