Just Walk Away...

On Sunday, I got three haircuts. I'm scheduled for hip surgery next Monday, so even though I have needed a haircut for some time, I was really trying to hold out until the week before...the last thing I'll want to think about during my recovery is my hair, right? 

So, as we drove home from church, stopping at the grocery store along the way, I decided I'd just pop into that shop by the grocery store. I am sure I have been there before, and aren't most of these drop-in salons pretty similar? That was my thought anyway. So I dropped in.

As I checked in and took a seat, I looked at the 4 stylists on the floor. "It'll be fine," I thought, "as long as I don't get that one, with the blue hair on 2/3 of her head...and the bad haircut." I've read in magazines that you shouldn't ever have your hair cut by someone with bad hair. I wasn't too worried, though, because the young gal with the funny blue haircut had just taken someone to her chair, and I was next on the queue. But, you know, Murphy must have been sitting next to me.

Big-Bad-Blue whips through that guy's hair, and calls my name. His hair looks fine. I look around at the other stylists, who all have lovely hair styles in varying shades of real hair colors and not, but still...three great haircuts. In my head, I am screaming, "Noooo! Not her!!!" But I've just come from church, and thoughts of grace and not judging and giving everyone a chance are swimming through my head. I get up, and I sit in her chair. I smile and say, "I have good hair. I'd like my bangs cut to just above my eyebrows, and then layer the rest pretty short. Taper it around my face, but do not leave my ears hanging out, please." She smiles, as though she understands, and I smile again, and she puts the cape on me.

After round one, my bangs are still in my eyes. She has only taken off half the hair that needs to come off, and she is rather pleased with herself. I put on my glasses and repeat the instructions. "Well, if I cut your bangs that short, they'll shrink up even more, and you won't like it." 

"I know. That's the way I always have it cut. I like it. I know I like it," I say with a smile, a little more forced than before. 

She says something about communication being difficult, it's hard to tell a stylist exactly what you want the hair to look like, yada yada yada. o_0 Then she cuts my bangs again, and she is pleased with herself, and I have the weirdest mullet you have ever seen. I coach her to match the top and back and sides to the length of the bangs, but she is not happy to give me the haircut I've asked for...probably because she now has to cut my hair twice...and I have a lot of hair, which she has mentioned several times. But I am now running low on grace...and patience...and hair. So I tell her it's fine, thank you, then I pay and leave. Two haircuts, not finished. 

I wish I had taken a picture at this point, but then again, no. The sides were twice as long as the bangs, which were not quite short enough. The top was shorter than the bangs by quite a bit, and I don't even know what was going on in the back. When I got to Best Cuts, the shop I usually go to, where I have given the same instructions to 2 or 3 girls who have done what I have asked multiple times, I am called back immediately. I tell the gal my story as she starts to run her fingers through my new "do," and she asks, "What did she DO to you???" Then, she fixes it. The first time. On my third haircut of the day. 

Now, this is only my second bad hair story in 47 years,* so I'll stop complaining here. After all, it's just hair. However, from now on, if I walk into a shop/salon and see any stylist with a style I don't like, I'm just going to walk away. The magazines are right. If she works in a place where she could easily have that fixed, yet she hasn't, it's simply not worth the risk.

By the way, to console myself, I came home and knitted quite a bit on a pair of socks. I am so glad to have knitting in my life!

I hope that your hair and knitting stories are all good this week. But please share if you've had a funny disaster...we can all use a good laugh, right?!?

Thanks for stopping by, and Knit in Good Health!

*My other really bad hair story involves a home perm, circa 1980-something, when I was in my teens. We all have a bad home perm story from the 80s, right? And no, there are no photos of that one either...lol!