~ The Pedicure That Changed My Hair ~

I got my hair cut today.  Seriously cut.  It WAS more than halfway down my back, and now it’s barely past my neck.

This particular change in me all started around last Thanksgiving.  A beautiful little asian woman, who was giving my crocodile feet a pedicure at the time, had told me that I was too old for long hair.  I smirked condescendingly at her when she said it.  I quietly rolled my eyes at her lack of enlightenment.  My self-confidence was not a bit worried about her head-on attack on my self-image.

But, and I hesitate to admit this…apparently she was too sly for me…. her ridiculously frank tactic had actually hit the mark after all; the damage was done.  She’d planted the seed in my psyche, and ever since then, more and more I’ve seen my long hair as a desperate grasp at my youth. Each long strand mocked by every silver strand.

So I did what any other delusioned 44 year old woman would do, and I bought a cheap box of temporary hair color.  Chestnut brown, if you must know.  Actually, I bought 2 boxes, figuring if some is good, more is better.  And I slathered that stuff on my hair like it was some kind of nasty smelling elixer of youth.  (I also got some on the bathroom sink, the linoleum floor, the bathtub, the shower curtain, and my ear.  But I didn’t figure that out until it had had a good long time to set.)

So now I had this seriously long, excruciatingly, impossibly perfectly mono-hued chestnut colored head of hair.   I looked like I had fallen head-first into a vat of Sharpie Ink.  Or dog-poo, depending on who you asked.

I don’t know what made me actually crack this morning, but I was at CVS, and Images Hair Salon was across the parking lot, calling out to me like a Siren to a sailor.  “Come to me, old woman, and cut your hair before you make an ass of yourself.”  “Come to me, granny, before you trip on your delusional tresses.”  “Come to me, before another tiny asian manicurist hits you below the belt.”

“Alright,” I thought, “If I’m meant to change my hair, they will have an immediate opening.  If not, I’ll forget the whole thing.”

They had an immediate opening.

Turns out, we had enough hair to donate to Locks of Love, a charity that makes wigs for children going through Chemotherapy.  I felt good about that…..until the sylist informed me that she believed Locks of Love doesn’t take hair that is either 1) gray or 2) colored.  Mine was both.  ***sigh***

Snip. Snip.  Edwina Scissorhands went to work.  And before I knew it, the deed was done.  My new hair-do felt significantly lighter. I liked it! As I left the salon, my step was a little bouncier.  Everyone I met “ooohed” and “aaahhed.”  I felt lovely.  Birds were singing.  The sun was shining.

My son, Garrick, saw it when he came off the bus and simply asked, “What happened to YOU?”

Daughter Gwen, my sweet, painfully honest peanut, saw it when I picked her up from Drama and said, “It looks good.  Not great, but good.”

And all of this because I got a Pedicure around Thanksgiving.

I wonder what chain of events I would start off if I got a Manicure?