Masochistic Hair Stylist

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I got my hair cut today. And I think my stylist was taking out her life frustrations on my head... my scalp is still throbbing.

I'm not a wuss when it comes to pulling hair. For my entire life I've had long hair (except for one unfortunate experiment with the "short hair is easier" myth in college - and no I don't have photos. I burned them.) With said locks, it's inevitable that you have to be rather stalwart, since it usually comes with plenty of painful associations. A few examples that come to mind are:

• Boy on bus in 7th grade pulling my hair from the seat behind me. I caught him at one point and dug my nails into his hand. Yes, the hair pulling was annoying, but he suffered more than I did. Aaah, a feminist even then.
• Hoodie- or turtleneck-induced "rat's nests" at the base of the neck, usually occurring in the winter months, and taking about an hour to release the hair, usually accompanied by much swearing and the desire to take a scissor and just hack the sucker out (after all, who would notice? It's underneath the rest of my hair!)
• The classic "fell asleep with gum in my mouth and then it fell into my hair" issue. I don't even want to tell you how we got that out... but I will tell you I smelled of many choice chemicals for a few days.
• Catching hair in car doors or closing windows on a few choice strands while cruising around town. (And why is it that the hairs that get caught are directly attached to the nerve endings that shoot pain into your eye?)
• I grew up with a sister. We didn't wrestle, we pulled hair. 'Nuff said.

So the point is, I'm not a hair wimp. But yesterday, after returning from Africa (where the shampoo was as gentle as turpentine), I decided that I needed to clean up the crackly ends of my locks that felt more like straw than actual human hair.

My stylist (who shall remain nameless), started out well, even though avoiding catching the comb in hoop earrings seems to be a perpetual challenge for her (note to self: next time you're entering haircut combat, remove all jewelry.) But the pain really started when she started blow drying. As anyone with any hair probably knows, wet, sticky hands running through your hair is NOT pleasant. Add scorching hot air and it's enough to want Novocaine scalp injections.

Then came the combing... and apparently in style school, the remedy for tangled hair is to pull really hard until the knot (or the hair) comes out... preferably with a large-tooth comb that has no flexibility whatsoever. I wouldn't be surprised if at some point, she had a professor for whom having a piece of bloodied scalp stuck to the ends was worth some extra credit. This went on for about 30 minutes.

I was never so happy to be done with a hair cut. And I was never more perplexed as to why this torture would cost me $80 (and you want a tip for this????) My head throbbed for hours. And while I've been known to be slightly sarcastic in my humor, I am not lying when I say that I took an aspirin later to cure my hair-cut hangover headache.

I was thinking of dying my hair red in the next few weeks... but maybe I'll find a gentler stylist before I do that. One that uses a chainsaw or something.
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