Life and All The Ways It's Weird...

I had made my peace with the fact that my hairstylist had broken up with me [my hair], so to speak. It was one of those breakups where the other party starts acting distant and non-commital, all the while assuring you that everything is fine, and that of course they still love you very much. You are left to deduce that you've been dumped by adding up the clues of his unreturned phone calls, his palpable absence from the routine of your life, his sudden inability to make it to anything that is even remotely important to you...

She'd simply stopped calling me back to set up appointments. After about 8 attempts (I am nothing if not dogged), I gave up and tried to be philosophical about it all, my hair becoming increasingly wretched for the lack of care.

There were a few issues:

1. Who could style and cut my hair like her? No one, that's who. Maybe I just wouldn't get my hair done ever again, I decided. I'd be one of those self-sufficient types who just goes it alone.

Nevermind that this tactic has NEVER once worked for me. My hair, left to its own devices, will dreadlock. Nothing against dreads, but it's different when it's unintentional...

2. If I wanted to find a new stylist, where would I start? Just randomly pick someone out of the phonebook and hope for the best? Go on a blind salon appointment? How desperate was I, anyway?

3. How could I ever trust another stylist to not ultimately reject me and my hair the way we had just been summarily dissed? I didn't think we were strong enough to handle that again.

In recent weeks I started to get desperate. The kerchief has become my best friend, covering a multitude of sins. But it's a fine line between being chic with it and it just becoming a ghetto crutch for having bad, bad tresses.

I was wearing one of said kerchiefs on Wednesday when I ran into Connie in the parking lot at Whole Foods. She recognized me first.

"Kate? You look really good; really good."

I smiled ambiguously, not sure what I should say in response.

"I haven't seen you in a long time!" She exclaimed.

"I tried to call you at least 8 times, " I said. "You never called me back." I'm sure I sounded bitter.

Once the look of incredulilty left her face, she said:

"And you left messages?"

I assured her that I had.

The long and short of it? I have an appointment this evening at 5:30.

I wonder how many relationships have ended because both people were under the impression that the other one no longer cared.