My Infidelity

I have a commitment problem.

No, no, nothing in my marriage.  I cannot commit to a hairstylist.  And trust me when I say it's not me, it's them.

I'm a simple girl when it comes to hair.  I don't like doing it in the morning -- I want to wash my hair at night and let it air dry.  No blow dryers for me.  I have thick, slightly wavy hair and lots of it -- if cut correctly I don't need to do much to it to make it look good -- run a brush through it, a few touch ups with a curling iron or maybe some quick shaping with some hot rollers, and I'm done.

Seems like I would be an easy enough client, right?  But no, finding and maintaining a relationship with a hairstylist is worse than dating ever was. 

First there's the blind date -- someone I know sets me up with this "great hairstylist --  you'll LOVE her.  She always does a great job!"  And so the dance begins.  Of course there's the scheduling -- when I have to find a time with the new stylist that also works with my schedule as a mommy when I won't have to bring two small children with me.  I have to try to convince the receptionist that, no, really, I have very thick hair, she's going to need extra time to wash/cut/dry my hair.  No, really.

Then I will show up -- invariably with either remnants of a haircut I hated (hence why I am not seeing the previous hairstylist) OR I really did like my previous hairstylist, but because I am apparently the fertility goddess to GOOD hairstylists, she became unexpectedly pregnant and decided to leave hairstyling longer than expected and my hair has become so grown out during my search for a replacement that the lines of my previously successful haircut are no longer is apparent in the forest of hair that is on my head.  Because I am never smart enough to actually take photos of myself when I like my hair in this decade, I will come with photos of myself from my twenties with hair cuts that are similar to what I like, but are slightly outdated and try in a bumbling way to explain what I want.  Those glossy magazines and oversized hairstyle books are of no use because they do not show photos of harried moms of two children who have outrageously thick hair with a slight wave in them who hate blow drying their hair and must have bangs because they hate their foreheads.  No, they show photos of actresses and supermodels with thin straight or very curly hair who have hairstylists on staff who can cut their hair short or add extensions as needed and who can have bangs one day and not have them the next.

The hairstylist will nod and seem to take it all in and one of two things will happen.  Either she will give me the best haircut of my life and I will fall in love instantly and think I have found a match made in heaven... or she will give me a hideous haircut and I will want to slit my wrists... but either way she'll chastise me for not booking a longer appointment because she'll say I have as much hair as three people and I'll have to fork over more money than most people spend on their first date.

My friend Julie has learned to be on red alert via cell after every appointment.  She's learned that the call can range from hysterical sobbing to "well, I'll know whether I really like it once I've washed and styled it myself."  But she knows that the story doesn't end there.

Oh no, because even when I think I've found The One, it's never that easy.  I can go back to the same stylist, 6 weeks later, and ask to have the exact same cut, and for some unknown reason they go psycho-insane on me.  The same person who understood at the first appointment that I don't like short layers in the back because it makes my hair go insanely poufy, will cut layers to my ears in the back.  The same person who understood why someone with hair as thick as mine wouldn't want to blow dry it every day will give me a style dependent upon being blown dry straight every morning -- it's like aliens inhabited her body while cutting my hair.  I had one stylist cut my bangs to half an inch.  Not by half an inch TO HALF AN INCH.  Who wants bangs that are half an inch long?  I was mortified.  I didn't even want to show my face in public, I was afraid people would think I had gone insane and done it myself!  Or let the JavaKids do it as some sort of fine motor exercise.

So after the Insane Second Cut, I am always left with the dilemma.  Do I go back and give them another chance?  Do I try to communicate again?  Or do I put myself through the hell of finding another stylist?  How did this happen?  How did things go so well the first time and so horribly awry the second time?  And really, how many salons can I sneak past as I walk by, hoping that a former stylist doesn't recognize me?  I'm embarrassed even to talk to the friend who set me up with her stylist in the first place after a disastrous second style -- what do I say? "Oh my goodness, what kind of a scissor-wielding psychopath did you send me to?"  I actually never went on many blind dates in my single life, I always managed to just find and fall in love with people on my own, but I can't imagine how awkward it must be to remain friends with someone if they tried to make a love match with someone who turned out to be a horrible mismatch!  At least with hair you can look at THEIR hair and say, "well YOUR hair looks good, so I'm pretty certain you weren't trying to send me to Edward Scissorhands."

I've "dated around" so much that I'm afraid one day I will run out of salons.  I actually mistakenly booked with the wrong stylist once (mixing up two stylists who were at the same salon with names that began with the letter M and was horrified to discover I booked the one I had "let go") and have since decided never to go back to the same salon once I've decided not to see a stylist anymore to avoid such errors ever again.  I feel like a hair whore!  But seriously... how hard can it be for a girl to just find a nice stylist to settle down with? 

When J.J. isn't searching for the perfect hairstylist or hiding under a paper bag from the last haircut, she writes about life, family and technology at Caffeine And a Prayer.  She's also praying that her hair is going to look alright at BlogHer since she has an appointment right after writing this -- if it does, please take a photo so she can use it at her next appointment.