Damn you, Emma Watson

I’ve been growing out my hair. It hasn’t exactly been an enjoyable process and I’ve done it before, so it’s not like I didn’t know what I was getting into, but I’ve been gutting it out.

Right until the internet discovered all the photos of Emma Watson’s haircut.It REALLY started with Carey Mulligan having cut off all her hair when she ruined it for  a film role. I collected photos and put them on my phone on the off-chance I decided I couldn’t hack the grow. At any rate, I managed to HOLD OFF.

And then came Emma. A pic of her new ‘do showed up on her Facebook page, which quickly made the web rounds. Then she made the cover of both British Vogue and Marie Claire for December, which meant that Jezebel AND Dorothy Snarker lit her up and it was just too much for me. I’ve never made any secret about how much I enjoyed having my hair über-short. This was exacerbated, of course, by Spouse deciding about a month ago that if I wanted to go back to shaving my head if I wanted.

What? YOU CAN’T WAVE A RED FLAG IN FRONT OF A BULL.

Anyhow, I decided I was going to try to keep growing until all these pictures were suddenly everywhere and the temptation was just too much. I posted a link to the pics and thought I’d maybe be able to think about it a couple of days. Then I woke up the next morning and new that the hair had to go. My regular stylist was sick yesterday so my options were to hold off until Monday (original plan) or go elsewhere. I managed to hold off for about four hours before I decided that I needed it done today.

I called Salon Axis in Edwards and got a 4pm appointment. Alexis did a great job and was, per usual, suitably cautious. “It’s going to be really short. Are you nervous?” No. “Are you sure you want to go this short? We could start longer.” No, really, CUT IT OFF.

This is where I should point out that I try to tell stylists right away that I’ve shaved my head before. It’s a cue that really, you don’t have to be scared of me flipping out about my hair being to short or too bad because shaving it is ALWAYS an option at that point. This doesn’t always set them at ease and I can understand that. In a business that’s largely word of mouth, you don’t want a client badmouthing you for giving them exactly what they asked for.

Her other funny concern was that I was trying it this short in the winter. Did I really want to do that? “Are you kidding? This is the best cut EVER for winter weather.” She looked at me. “No hat in the world can fuck it up!” She laughed and relaxed at that point. My hair turned out a bit shorter than the pictures I gave her as a guide, but that’s okay.  Right now I can’t figure out why I ever wanted to grow my hair again. Clearly I’m just no longer a Long Hair person. Additional funny – Alexis seemed pleasantly surprised that the cut looks good on me.