Opinion

Why I hate going to the hairdressers

The instant I open the door, I start to feel tense. I can see a mass of blonde hair and it smells like strawberries and I don’t know what to do. Someone comes over and asks if I have an appointment and I tell them that, yes, I do, one at 12pm with Sarah. I then sit and pretend to read a very old copy of OK! Magazine with Peter Andre on the cover whilst trying to mentally calm myself down. Apart from the blonde hair and the strawberry scent, you’d be forgiven for thinking I was in some kind of waiting room – doctors, dentist, maybe. But no, I’m at the hairdressers, a place that would absolutely feature on my list of Top 10 Places I Hate The Most, if I had one. At 12.05pm, Sarah comes over, and takes me through for my consultation, a word which both confuses me and fills me with visions of hospitals until I realise this is a set time to discuss my hair-related hopes. What am I wanting to have? What kind of thing am I thinking of? By this point I am struck by how boring my idea is (“a trim”) and how greasy my hair looks (it really could’ve done with a wash this morning but why bother with two hair washes in a day?) and I attempt some ridiculously unfunny joke about how infrequently I have my hair cut, in a light-hearted attempt to excuse my impressive collection of split ends. I can now see poor Sarah visibly judging me. She’s trying not to, but it’s evident she spent about four hours on her hair this morning and I squirm uncomfortably as she touches my un-styled spray-free mop, trying to remember the last time I felt less attractive.

When we’ve chatted to our hearts’ content about my imminent hairstyle, I am handed a robe, which I can almost never remember how to put on properly. Does the Velcro go at the front or at the back, I wonder frantically, whilst the stylists look at me curiously. “Would you like to see our drinks menu?” I am asked, and I think quickly. A thousand questions fill my head. WOULD I? Will I have to pay for this drink? Why is there a menu? Can I have tap water or would that look cheap? Normally opting for “No thanks, I just had one”, I uncomfortably gather up my belongings and plop myself down onto the chair in front of the sink. This is stressful in itself. Am I sitting far back enough, I puzzle, whilst sliding up and down trying to find a position that will enable my neck to feel comfortable (there isn’t one). “Is the water okay?” asks Sarah. “Yes!” I say cheerily without having actually paid attention (oh, the curse of the eager-to-please) and feel relieved when the water doesn’t burn my ears or freeze my neck.

The next part, of course, is the shampoo/conditioner session, which I think I could possibly enjoy if I wasn’t straining my neck and feeling so uncomfortable. It is, after all, more or less a free head massage. Just as I start to relax as well as I can, another issue arises. I haven’t been paying attention. Have I been conditioned? Should I be getting up? Every time I guess this, I am wrong: if I start to move my head, as if to leave my chair, Sarah says “Just pop your head back for me” and I am re-conditioned. If I stay tilted back, I hear a confused “Hello?” and look up to see Sarah, clearly ready to go, whilst I am lying oblivious with my head stuck in a sink. How embarrassing. Cue the awkward towel-around-the-shoulders move and off we go, Sarah gliding across the salon with her blonde mane effortlessly swinging from side to side, whilst I follow behind, looking like a drowned rat in a Hogwarts robe.

Once I am settled safely in my seat, the main event can begin. Sarah always starts trimming my hair at the back, and whilst we are chatting about what we did yesterday (I always get the urge to lie upon remembering I didn’t do a whole lot), I notice my fringe starting to curl awkwardly. Too embarrassed to tell her that if it’s not pounced upon the second after it’s been washed it WILL NOT DRY FORMING ANY SEMBLANCE OF AN ACTUAL FRINGE, I attempt to tuck it behind my ears. When Sarah reaches the fringe, it is beyond even her help. She dries it and sprays stuff on it and straightens it and I still look like Peggy Olson circa Mad Men Season 1 so we unspokenly decide never to mention it again. “You know what I’m thinking?” says Sarah, “I’m thinking we really BOOF your hair up a bit”. Sure, I think, it ain’t gonna look any worse than it already does.

Then comes the question: “Do you want any product in it?”. I don’t know if this is just me being odd, but the word ‘product’ annoys me. I think it’s because it normally would signify one thing, and I would choose to say ‘products’, instead, but maybe this is like a sheep/sheep thing except limited to hairdressing lingo. Unsure of exactly which product Sarah means, I nod. Why the heck not? It all smells nice and I’m paying enough. So I am sprayed and coiffed and before I know it Sarah is doing that thing where she shows me my hair in the mirror whilst using another mirror. “Great!” I say automatically, but then I stop. It does actually look okay. Maybe going to the hairdressers isn’t so bad. Not if Sarah can give my hair this much volume and…boofiness. My fringe has somehow been salvaged and hasn’t done the greasy-five-minutes-later thing it does when I dry it. Wow.

So I say goodbye to Sarah, head to the tills to pay someone else (which always confuses me) and worry about whether or not to leave a tip. I want to…but I don’t have a job…but is it rude not to?…but that is literally all I have to buy lunch with…is a pound too stingy? Usually deciding that, yes, a pound is too stingy, I bid the salon farewell and carry out my new loyalty card, customer recommendations that I am instructed to give to any and all of my friends, and a sense that maybe, just maybe, that wasn’t so bad. That is, until I wake up the next morning and realise I must recreate Sarah’s masterpiece with my 99p Alberto Balsalm shampoo and a hairdryer without a working ‘heat’ button…

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