Last week, it was time for my 7 week haircut and color touchup. I’m a very natural brunette right now, only a shade or two darker than my actual color, and about two shades lighter than my winter standard, which is, according to pictures from Weetapie last year, a shade too dark. And yet, I’ll probably go there again come February, because I found out that Esteban has serious crushes on both Sela Ward and Nigella Lawson. I can’t compete with Sela Wards eyebrows because they are absolutely fantastic, but dark hair? No problem.
When my stylist asked how much I wanted cut off, I replied “A lot” because I was getting sick of my hair slipping into my jackets and getting trapped. Plus, my hair is fine, which means at a certain length, there’s just too much weight to have any volume whatsoever. Which sucks, because really, I’m just counting down the days until big hair comes back. I have got back combing down to a science. My stylist looked at me and made a pinchy shape with her fingers, saying “this much?” and I replied “At least.” Because I was being passive aggressive about it all. I don’t really like to make decisions about my hair. I’d rather accidentally fall into some perfect style and shape. This has not been a winning strategy for me so far but I hold out hope.
She cut off six inches. Six inches! Half a ruler. An octave on a piano. The average size of a male unit. Six freaking inches. I didn’t think I had that much to give, honestly. I would have thought, six inches, man, I’d be sporting a pixie cut, no question. Except apparently, I had many more inches to give than that. My hair was longer than I thought, maybe Marsha Brady long. And while it is now shorter than it has been in at least two years, maybe more, it’s Rachel Green Season 1 length, a good length. One of those lengths they recommend in women’s magazines for flattering any face shape. It takes so much less time to blow dry and style and I have to remind myself not to dump so much product into my hand because I’m wasting half a palmful of Sap Moss shampoo every morning. I walk around and shake my head because it feels so light and swingy. I spritz and suddenly my locks can defy gravity once again, making little burls and tousles of artful mess that is the style of the moment. Six inches are all the inches in the world.
Except that they’re not. I went from having long hair to having medium-length hair and not a soul has noticed. I look at myself and think, wow, jeez, short! I had to point out my haircut to my sister. Esteban, the man who looks at me every single day, looked at me when I returned from the salon and said “Hey….What time do you have to go to your hair appointment tonight?”
Clearly, I should have gone for a seventh inch.
