La Dolce Vita

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La Strada

Do you ever find yourself in a situation where you realize if you could just rewind back to one moment a few hours, or days, or weeks before, you could avoid whatever unpleasantness is happening right then? Well, I felt this way a few weeks ago when a very large man named Marty was pressing his warm, full belly into the side of my body as he leaned over to cut my hair. How in the hell did I end up here? I thought to myself. Then I remembered.

Picture the young (somewhat), naive (arguably), freshly-scrubbed (naturally) maiden, recently landed on the streets of Manhattan; cheeks rosy with the autumn air and a good brisk walk, eyes continually wandering up along the flanks of really tall buildings, full of promise, ready to take on the Big City. Suddenly, a youngish blonde woman with a clipboard stops her. Oh, here we go, our heroine thinks, because of course she’s not quite as naive as all that. But knowing she’ll be offered something which she’ll politely refuse, and because it will be some hours before Bed Bath and Beyond closes, she stops and waits for the pitch.

“Thank you SO much for stopping! It’s brutal out here, nobody stops!” says the blonde with an exhalation.

Well, I guess I am pretty cool for stopping, eh? Screw these high-powered Manhattanites! I treat people like HUMAN BEINGS. Even people with shitty jobs that make them stop people on the street. Yeah, I rock.

“Where do you get your hair cut?” chirps the blonde with what sounds like an Irish accent.

Uh, nowhere yet. I just got here.

“Oh!” Does the gleam in her eyes brighten a bit? “Where did you come from?”

Seattle.

“And how much did you pay for a haircut there?”

Thinking of my faithful and talented haircutter, Meredith at Vain, is painful. Would it be possible to ever replace her? I fear not.

I guess around $40

“That’s pretty good!” She falters a bit. “Well, what do you think of receiving over $300 worth of beauty services for the price of a haircut?”

I think that’s just fine, I say blankly.

She whips out a pink card with a bullet-point list running down the left hand side. “You can get all of this,” she sweeps the list with her pen, “for only $60! That’s a little more than you paid in Seattle”--she says Seattle like it’s a part of town you in which you don’t want to be caught after dark--“But at our salon, the basic rate for a haircut is $75, so you’re already saving $15!”

I try to work out the logic of this, while she continues her monologue.

“You see here,” as she ticks off the bullet points with her pen, “you get an image consultation, precision haircut, shampoo massage, conditioning treatment, blow dry, skin analysis, mini facial, choice of manicure or pedicure, shoulder massage, eyebrow wax AND lip wax – ALL for just $60!”

I start to think about how the first five items on the list are usually included with the standard haircut, but soon I’m wondering how many women in New York actually get their lips waxed. Is it painful? Do people compliment them the next day (Why Barbara! How smooth and hairless your lip looks!)? What happens when it starts growing back? Do you get stubble? Do they have to wait for the stubble to get a certain length before they get another wax? Do women actually go to work with lip stubble? Can that possibly be more attractive than a little girly-mustache? The words lip wax play over and over in my mind like a line from a particularly bad pop song. I’m supposed to say something.

Great.

“Wonderful,” crows the blonde. “Will that be Visa or MasterCard?”

8 1/2

A month later, I’m in a cab driving through the pouring rain at rush hour from Park Slope, Brooklyn towards midtown Manhattan. I am screaming into my cell phone at the real estate agent who has TWICE stood me up to show me an apartment that I really wanted to see. I’m a half hour late to my haircut appointment at The Peek-a-Boo salon, as it reads on my pink card.

“I sat on the front steps for FORTY-FIVE MINUTES!” I bellow into the phone.

By this time I know that I should be taking the subway—this cab ride is going to be very expensive, and much slower. Driving through Manhattan traffic—in the rain—is probably slower than any other available method of transportation, including standing still and attempting to mentally teleport. But I was late, and desperate, and not thinking entirely straight. Since I’m stuck with my bad planning, I decide to at least get some important calls made.

“I don’t WANT you to apologize, I just want to know WHAT HAPPENED!”

***

Finally, I’m standing in front of what is supposed to be The Peek-a-Boo Salon on the West side. A big colorful sign above the door reads “Wild Nails,” accompanied by a winking cartoon of a baby Satan. However, a paper sign taped to the door matches the name on my pink card, so I go in.

A young Asian man leaps up from the front desk (which is little more than a podium with a little wire letter-holder on top), tutting and cooing about my damp entrance, offering to take my coat, sweetie.

Sorry I’m [an hour and a half] late, I say guiltily, handing over my coat.

“Oh, don’t worry sweetie. No problem at all. Let me just get you signed in.”

I wonder who will be cutting my hair. The only person there other than the Asian man and a handful of busy stylists is a lanky older guy with a bad perm sitting in the window talking on a cell phone.

“Okay! So that will be $17.95”

What?

“There’s a service fee when you begin your promotion,” said the Asian man, pointing to my pink card.

I look at the card:

ONE TIME $15 SERVICE FEE + TAX

PAYABLE AT SALON PLUS TAX

Apparently I missed this, distracted by the Irish blonde’s sweeping pen. I wonder dully if they’ll charge me double the tax since the fine print mentions it twice. I hand over my debit card. My $60 haircut is now over $75, and nobody has yet touched my hair.

“This is Angelo, he’ll be taking care of you today!”

I turn around, and the older guy with the bad perm is grinning at me.

I figure it will be easier if I try to imagine that I’m in a Fellini movie, and just go with it. My mood improves, a little. Angelo sits me down in a haircut chair, and I steel myself for what is sure to be the “Image Consultation.”

Not at all sure I want my image consulted by a middle-aged guy with a bad perm, I try to figure out ways of minimizing the damage. Luckily I brought some pictures that I had hastily ripped out of an “In Style” magazine. I pull them out and start holding them up to Angelo. His face lit up.

“Aha! You see ziz, zeez red chunks!” I was holding up an ad for a hair coloring, but as a model for the cut, not the color.

Yeah, uh, I used to have something like that, but you see how it kind of goes over her ears here…

“You are young, no? Your hair, it eez too heavy. You need ze leeft! You need ze highlights!”

Highlights?

“Not like ziz,” Angelo gestured toward the picture. “Not ze beeg chunks. Veery subtle, veery natural. Veery important—vith ze glasses, and ze dark colors you war. You need light, you need to leeft up, up! You listen to me, it be good, no?”

Well, uh, I’m kind of in a hurry. I have to be somewhere by…

“TEN MEENUTES! You out of here by five o’clock, okay? I promise.”

Oh, what the hell.

“Exzellent!” Angelo walks off.

I try hard not to think about exactly how much of a sucker I am.

Angelo returns with a pot of familiar-smelling bleachy color. I recall those carefree days with Meredith, coaxing my poor overworked hair from brown to maroon to black to blonde to brown again. Oh, how we laughed and laughed!

Angelo starts placing pieces of foil on my scalp, and I speak up.

Say, does this cost anything extra?

Angelo waves the question away.

“Eet is nothing! Veery leetle! I geev you anuzzer free haircut, OK? You come in again, you don’t pay, see?”

I see.

He picks out bits of hair and brushes them with the color. At least he seems to be doing it right.

Half an hour later Angelo is putting the finishing touches on his new masterpiece. The highlights are hard to see in the funny salon lighting, but they seem okay, if a bit orangey. However, Angelo has blow-dried my hair to something resembling the size and shape of a space helmet. Believe it or not, I’m used to this. For some reason, everyone who encounters my hair for the first time tends to want to make it as poofy as possible; it’s easy enough to fix once I’m out of their clutches. Then he grabs the hairspray. I close my eyes and think: Fellini movie.

It’s done; I’m free. I get up from the chair, nodding to Angelo that yes, “ze highlights” look very nice. Angelo suddenly drops his voice and looks at me conspiratorially.

“For your next appointment, I vant you to call me on my cell phone.”

What?

Angelo looks around “Zis place, it ees no good. I have auzzer place, much nicer. Upper East Side. You call me zere. I give you free haircut zere.”

Uh, but what if I want to come here?

“Sometimes I no work here, sometimes I’m at ze uzzer place.”

So I have to call you directly to get the free haircut?

“No, no,” Angelo says quickly, “you get free haircut here, zere, eezer way ees okay. But I give you my cell phone.”

I take it politely, thinking hard that I never, ever want to see Angelo again. I was already trying to catch the name of the cute redhead queen who was cutting the hair of the person across from me, making very pleasant conversation. I don’t know if he could cut hair, but at least he wasn’t creepy.

I fetched my coat and went to the front desk, er, podium. The Asian man picked up my pink card and started making marks by the services I’d received.

“Geev her anuzzer haircut” Angelo commanded. “I told ‘er she could get anuzzer one.” The Asian man looked a little confused, but he marked off all but “Precision haircut” at the top of the list. I wondered if this meant I’d have to pay for my “shampoo massage” next time.

“Okay, looks like it will be $120!”

So that’s the going rate for highlights in Manhattan. I sigh, and pass over the debit card.

My $60 haircut is now nearly $200.

For all the hardship, the haircut really was pretty nice. As I suspected, the highlights were a little too orangey, but I’d applied some $7 cherry-red drugstore color and now they looked spiffy. And although Angelo’s cut wasn’t quite as artistic as Meredith’s were, I was quite happy with it. On top of it all, I had finally bullied the real estate agent into showing up for an appointment, and I was taking the apartment, so life was good.

La Dolce Vita

Six weeks later I looked in the mirror and realized the inevitable: I needed another haircut.

I dug the pink card out from one of my moving boxes and reluctantly called The Peek-a-Boo Salon once again. I didn’t really have a choice. How could I go somewhere else and pay even $30 for a haircut when I had a free one waiting? They couldn’t sock me with any more hidden charges, I figured. I already paid the one-time service fee, and I didn’t need any more highlights. I suspected they might try to charge me for the shampoo or something, but that couldn’t be much, and it would still be less than getting a haircut elsewhere. When I called to make the appointment, they said they couldn’t tell me who my stylist would be until I showed up. I just hoped that Angelo wouldn’t be there.

The day of my appointment I got out of the Subway and walked down 9^th Avenue, proud of myself for arriving promptly this time. I checked my directions again—between 54^th and 55^th, okay. But wait. I looked. That’s where I was. I gazed up and down the block. These buildings look familiar, I know I’m in the right place, but I couldn’t see The Peek-a-Boo Salon, or even the “Wild Nails” sign. Flummoxed, I dialed The Peek-a-Boo’s number on my cell phone, vaguely remembering that the last time I had called I’d been given a forwarding number. When they answered, I asked them where they were.

“We’re on the East side, between Park and Lex.”

What? When did you move?

“About three weeks ago.”

I remembered that when I called, nobody said anything about where they were, or that they had moved recently. Assuming that most people get their hair cut every four to six weeks, it seemed a bit irresponsible to not remind callers making new appointments that they had a new location.

Well, I wish I had known that! I’m going to be late now; I’m way over on 9^th Avenue!

“Oh… I’m sorry.”

Can you move my appointment back or something?

“Sure, sure, no problem at all, honey. We’ll see you when you get here!”

Since I was nowhere near a cross-town subway, I grabbed a cab. When I emerged from the taxi I saw a salon, but it had a huge yellow sign reading “Sweet Charity.” Confused, I looked around, but at the entrance to Sweet Charity, there was, again, a small paper sign labeled “Peek-a-Boo Salon” and a little arrow pointing up. So, I went up the stairs to the second floor. Apparently, this Sweet Charity place and Peek-a-Boo were the same thing—and maybe Wild Nails too, for that matter.

On the second floor I was greeted by a tremendous drag queen. Oh wait, no, she was a real girl, with drag-worthy make-up. She held her hand out for my card, expecting it. I wondered if anyone ever came there if they didn’t have one of those cards. She waved vaguely behind her “Go hang up your coat, honey, and Marty will take care of you.”

Marty?

Ever the optimist, I looked around hopefully. The first thing I noticed is that there seemed to be about five staff members for each customer. Near the windows sat a clutch of guys, talking together. One of the men had a truly horrific only-James-Brown-can-get-away-with-it pompadour and high-heeled boots. On the other side of the salon, the only two customers I saw were a woman getting a manicure, and another woman having bleach applied to her roots. Near them, an enormous man was eating a sandwich. Marty.

While I waited for Marty to finish his nosh, I thought this might be okay. A big queen could be really fun. He would be boisterous and hilarious and we’d spend the whole time comparing our favorite teen-movie heartthrobs, what a gas. The womanish thing at the counter told me to sit in the chair at the end of the row, so I obliged, even though there was hair all over the floor around it. Almost as soon as I sat down, another woman motioned me out of the chair so she could sweep up.

Finally, Marty came over. He pawed through my hair, pulling it this way and that as stylists do; I always wonder just what they are looking for up there. He didn’t say anything, so I answered the unasked question:

Just the same thing. Just the same thing, but shorter.

Marty just frowned, still pawing. Maybe we wouldn’t be dishing about Josh Hartnett after all.

It’s been about six weeks since I’ve had it cut, so … I faltered.

More frowning, more pulling.

“Let’s shampoo you.”

I got up, and expected Marty to lead me over to the shampoo bowl. But he just waved me over to the area where the woman was getting her nails done. I’m used to the person cutting my hair being the one to wash it, so I was surprised when the same woman who swept under my chair indicated I should sit down at the sink.

I normally use shampoo time as bonding time with my hair-cutter, before the sharp instruments come out, so it was rather off-putting to have this stranger shampooing me in silence. The woman who was getting her hair bleached next to me asked the woman getting her nails done “are you getting a facial too?” The manicure-recipient nodded. The bleached woman said, “Yeah I thought so—I’ll be doing it.” So, one of the “customers” actually worked there. Of the twelve or so people in the whole place, only two of us were customers. And I suspected that both of us had pink cards. How was this place staying in business? I noticed that the woman getting her nails done had a small sliver of blood along the side of one of her nails—an apparent cuticle-snipping mishap. Maybe I should forget about the manicure part of the pink card, I thought.

Washed and toweled, I was sent wordlessly back to Marty. I sat down, and once again, he’s pulling the hair. He started combing it around. “How long’s it been since you’ve had it cut?” he asked. I already told him this, but I answered.

Six weeks.

“Where did you get it done?”

Here.

“Whaddya mean, here?”

Well, I mean, your other location. Before you moved.

Marty frowned. Apparently it was unexpected that someone would come to this place more than once, and I was beginning to see why.

Then he started cutting. I’m used to some socializing with my hair cutter, and for some reason I hadn’t yet been defeated.

So! Is Sweet Charity the same thing as The Peek-a-Boo Salon? Did one of them buy the other one or something?

“I dunno,” Marty grunted.

Oh, how long have you been working here?

“Six months.”

So, Marty had been working at the same place for six months, but didn’t seem aware of any other location, nor the relationship between two places, both of whose names were on the door? As Marty cut, I noticed that the clutch of guys still talking behind me, including the “James Brown” character, had sort of a familiar vibe to them. I couldn’t place it, but it reminded me of something, like they should be sitting around a red-and-white checkered tablecloth…

I looked at Marty, his ample belly pressing into my side. He had a tattoo on the back of his hand.

Oh my god! I thought. Am I in the clutches of the haircut mafia? The guys talking quietly behind me certainly looked Italian enough, and they had the manner of wiseguys discussing “business.” Restaurant, beauty salon—what’s the difference? I wondered if Marty learned to cut hair as part of his work-release program. Or—gulp—perhaps he had never learned to cut hair at all! This butcher was hacking away at my head, and god knows if he knew what he was doing. He certainly didn’t seem to want any input from me. I was going to look like a freak! I’d end up like the drag-queen/not-drag-queen creature at the front desk! I closed my eyes and swore to myself that if I was lucky enough to emerge alive from Sweet Charity with my beehive hair disaster and bloody fingernails; I’d run all the way home and hide. I’ll tear my pink card to bits! I will never buy haircuts on the street again! If I ever see that the staff outnumbers customers by more than two-to-one I will leave! There’s no such thing as a free haircut! I do believe in spooks, I do believe in spooks, I do I do I do I do I do!

“The blowdry’s not included.”

I opened my eyes. What?

Marty was looking at me, dryer in hand. “The blow’s not included—in the promotion.”

Oh, uh, okay. How much is it?
”You’ve got short hair,” he shrugged, “20 bucks.” It seemed like he made up the figure on the spot.

Okay. Just let me leave!

Marty started drying. “I always hate telling people that,” he said. I think that was as close to apologetic as he gets.

After smoothing and prodding my coif into perfection, Marty hands me a mirror, so I can look at the back. But he fails to turn the chair, so it’s useless. I wonder if he’s ever cut hair before.

Fine, fine. I want to get out of here!

Once I leave, I’m free. I can push my hair into some sort of reasonable shape. I’m out from the haircut hell that is Sweet Peek-a-Boo. I can be free of its criminal mastermind anti-stylists!

At the counter, I hand them the twenty bucks for the “free” haircut. Unbelievably, I include a tip. The drag-queen demon writes “Marty” in big curly letters across the face of the pink card. I’ve been branded, labeled, promised. I’m his. I take the card and run down the stairs.

At the bottom of the stairs there’s a big, gold-framed mirror, I guess to give one last check before braving the cold stares of the East-Siders on their way from Burberrys to Pottery Barn. I look. I have been given the usual bulbous helmet-head that results from a too-poofy blow-dry. As I attempt to prod my hair into something less embarrassing, I realize that I didn’t in fact have helmet-head at all—I had retard hair. I-Am-Sam, Juliette-Lewis-in-The-Other-Sister, little-bus, developmentally disabled hair. That corpulent felon and that blonde Irish bitch have conspired to make me look like I need orthopedic shoes and laugh too loud. Fuck it. Fuck them. Fuck Peek-a-Bullshit. Fuck my $230 “special promotion.” Fuck beauty, fuck the East Side, fuck fucking Burberrys and fucking-fuck Pottery Barn!

I walked up the street, bought a ticket to Mulholland Drive, and I haven’t had a haircut since.