So I realized after I posted about the nice guy who cut my hair, I realized I was so distracted by the fact that he wasn’t a creep that I almost forgot all the other stuff that happened.
I decided to update the post because after I talked to Nick I realized it was a pretty unusual experience.
When I walked into the salon it was basically empty. The secretary said, “Tom, will cut your hair today” (let’s call him Tom (even though I won’t refer to him by name after this) because pseudonyms are mysterious and mystery is sexy). He walked over and introduced himself. The first thing I noticed were the Satanic stars on his elbows and his shaky hands.
I thought, this could either be a very good haircut or a very bad haircut. You can decide for yourself.
Before I’d arrived I chose a photo to work off of and showed it to him. He said, “Oh I’ll use the razor on you!” and I thought, “He sounds eager”.
I was only asking for an inch or two off but I think he had something entirely else in mind. So while he’s chopping away at my hair with a straight edge razor (like James Bond but less sexy), he’s explaining (mansplaining, cough, cough) how water pollution works, why native Hawaiians are dumb to have chosen to live at the bottom of a volcano and how Californians’ air is filled with snobbery as if snobbery is an element on the periodic table.
All light and occasionally racist small talk. I just sat there and stared at the blade in his hand as he progressively got angrier at the topics he chose.
Then I heard, “Oh god!” from the back of my head. I thought I lost a chunk of myself but luckily it was his finger. He cut himself open on the razor blade.
“Happens all the time!” he said as he ran to the bathroom.
The secretary had left for lunch and I sat there alone twiddling my thumbs with elevator music in the background and constant groaning coming from the bathroom.
He reappeared a few minutes later with his finger wrapped in toilet paper taped with a bandaid.
“Everything’s fine! Happens all the time.”
I don’t think he realized it didn’t make me feel better that this was a constant for him.
Whether he needed stitches or not, he pressed on.
“Let me get a new blade out for you,” he said as we both thought, “Because the other one is covered in blood and now I’m thinking about AIDS unnecessarily.”
His hands were shaking even worse now and the toilet paper was making his finger quite immobile. “Got it!” he said triumphantly as it slipped free, flew into the air and landed on the ground.
We both looked at it. Then looked at each other. “Third times the charm!”.
He got back to my hair and continued chopping. Chatting away about how you could live in Chernobyl if you really wanted to. I won’t knock him for interesting opinions that’s for sure.
He reached around me for the comb but found his hand had gotten stuck in my hair. The thick finger had caught and all he could do was pull my head with him.
I bobbed back and forth in front of the mirror and made eye contact with myself, “Well at least he’s not stroking my hair and calling me precious.” I’m an optimist like that.
Once he detangled himself with some nice product I was free to go. Literally. My hair was completely lopsided. The front right side was the original length when I walked through the door and the top layers (when did I ask for layers?) was maybe three inches long.
“Asymmetry is in these days,” he said.
I nodded and paid him and then went home delighted that he didn’t sexually harass me that I wrote a post about it and completely neglected to include any of this stuff which just shows how low my standard is for dealing with strange men and my standard for run on sentences.