lovable moptop

I had a glorious 'maintanence day' today. I heard that on TV last night on a show I am too embarassed to admit I watched. I thought, what a great idea! I want a pampering 'maintanence day' too! So after doing a bunch of work this morning, I struck out to find a new haircutter. My last haircut went a little awry and I had to fix it with my thread scissors in the locker room one day before a swim...

I had been going to this place across the street from the Y in my neighborhood where none of the cutters speak English -- only Polish. So I had my haircuts translated through the receptionist who spoke English. And it always worked out well. But on that one particular day, the receptionist was a new girl, and a very uncharacteristically cheeky one at that. When she translated my desires for "no razor, no thinning sheers, because it makes my curly hair frizz, only scissors please," I saw my haircutter, Kasia's face change to disgruntled. What the heck did she say to her? I knew I was in for it.

So suffice it to say, I tried a new place today, called BIOMASK. Ominous, no? But the place was painted chartreuse, and I am strangely attracted to chartreuse. What can go wrong in a place that is painted chartreuse? Despite my trepidation, I got another translated haircut. My stylist, Maria, was amazing! The way she sectioned my whole head with clips and cut each hair (only scissors, no problem this time), I knew she was a true artist. And then I untensed my entire body and enjoyed the pampering.

The blowdry was included in the $25.00 price, so I went for the works. (I haven't put a blow dryer to my curly hair since I had the Dorothy Hamill haircut in 3rd grade. Yes, that cut did not work on curly hair, but I loved ice skating and Dorothy Hamill.) She asked, "Blow dry?" and I said, "A little," and she said "?" with her eyes, and I said, "Yes, a little," and she turned on the blow dryer and took out the big round brush. Rather than say, "What? A brusssh? You didn't mention a brush! Could you please put that brush away!?" I said nothing and watched in amazement while she straightened my hair and styled it like Dorothy Hamill. She made my hair so volumetric at one point that my eyes popped out of my head a little, and the girl next to me said in envy, "Wow, you have a lot of hair!" People always say that to me at the salon, and I kind of like it. I am very hair-centric.

So I took the back streets home with my new Dorothy Hamill blow out. And then I realized I had to get milk on the main street. I imagined everyone looking at me, saying, "WOW, look at all that hair!" or "Hmm, isn't that an interesting choice for a hairstyle," or "Didn't she used to have that cute curly flapper-style hair?" and things of that nature.

Then I got bolder (because the new hair bounced a lot and felt strange in a good way) and took myself and my hair to Williamsburg to return an umbrella to a friend. And then I took myself and my new hair straight down Bedford, and boldly onto the L train, and to the McBurney Y on 14th Street and 6th Avenue right straight in the front door and downstairs to the locker room and into the center lane of the pool and changed my hair back to curly. I must say, it is looking very curly and stylish right now.

This week, I am going to look for a English-Polish dictionary and learn key haircutting vocabulary. All the dictionaries in my neighborhood go the wrong way for me: Polish-English. I know how to say, "Please help me!" (Prosze mi pomoc) and "I don't speak Polish" (Nie mowie po polsku) and "Please write that down" (Prosze to napisac). But those phrases don't really come up in haircuts.


Question for you: Would you chance a translated haircut? Do tell.