Mrs. Potato Head

I’m a drama queen, but when it comes time to actually being in moments of drama, I’m not exactly the best. I don’t overly showcase emotions, I have a problem with downplaying things of actual severity, and I chose to do the thing that Ginsberg’s have done for decades — push it all deeeeep, deep, down and respond with passive aggression.

The woman cutting my hair asked me four times if I was sure I wanted to cut off 8 inches.

Every time, I responded with a stern “i’m sure.” Definitely with a little bit of attitude, while simultaneously holding back that feeling down in the bottom of my throat. The feeling when you know you want to cry, but you won’t allow yourself too.
“Cut it all off!” I said firmly. I wanted it all gone.

Every time I mentioned wanting to cut all of my hair all off, my mom would tell me I would look like Mrs. Potato Head. I refrained, but always kept the idea on the back burner. Now, there was really no reason to worry about it. I wanted to do it. I knew I would likely regret doing this later, but for now, in this moment, it was what I wanted. I wanted to dye it, cut it all off, and give everyone around me something else to talk about other than telling me they were so sorry about my recently deceased mother.

As soon as she cut the first chunk off, I felt like I was in the movie Thirteen when they started breathing in the keyboard cleaner spray. Who knew that something as vain and meaningless as cutting your hair could make you feel so high?

The more she went, the better I felt. It was new. Something different. Even if I did end up looking like Mrs. Potato Head, it was a decision that I made for myself to make me feel better.

When it was done, I felt like a different person. I kind of forgot about the shit storm that was my life at the moment. Instead, I just kept looking at myself — and I liked what I saw. It was perfect.

“That will be $350.”

$350? Thank god for this gift card.

The receptionist, Jeannie, looks at me -

“Can I see ID?”
What is this? Am I 17 buying Svedka from a liquor store?

I tell her sure, but warn her that the names won’t match. This gift card is my mothers and she is letting me use it.

Jeannie looks at me confused. “We have a policy, you can’t share a gift card. Your name doesn’t match, so unfortunately it won’t work.”

I feel my blood boiling and I get that feeling in my throat again.

“What do you mean it won’t work? I’m telling you she is ok with me using it.” I tell the receptionist.

She tells me she’s sorry, but rules are rules.

Rules are fucking rules.

My throat is burning. But this time, it’s more than that. I can feel myself getting the other feeling. That other feeling when my face gets hot and I talk really fast, flailing with my arms, and cursing every five seconds.

“Well, Dawn is actually dead, I’ll have her death certificate in 7–9 business days. I can come in and show it to you then, or you can take my fucking word for it that she would be ok with me using it. Seeing as she’s a little preoccupied to use it herself, being dead and all.“

Her face goes blank. She starts frantically apologizing — telling me she is so sorry.

The three words I have been trying to avoid — “I’m so sorry.”

I’m suddenly mortified. This poor girl was just doing her job, she had no idea that my mom suddenly passed away 4 days ago.

Rules ARE quite actually rules.

This poor girl can’t be over 17, and i’m 23 at the time. I’m picking on a little kid named Timmy in the playground.

I just wanted a haircut. I wanted to do something dramatic that would make me feel better, but instead, this somehow made me feel worse.

She tells me it’s ok, she’ll make the gift card work.

I leave a tip on the counter for the person who cut my hair and I run out.
I ran right into my car and started sobbing. It was only the second time I really cried in the last four days. I cried at the funeral and in the parking lot of A.F. Bennett Hair Salon and Spa on New Dorp Lane in Staten Island. The last possible place I would ever want or expect to cry.

I cried the whole drive home to Glitter in the Air by Pink, Landslide by Fleetwood Mac. The radio knew I hated myself in this moment and really just wanted to fuck with me. It was that uncontrollable type of sobbing. The kind that makes your whole body kinda sob along with it.

When my dad saw me when I walked in the door, I think he could tell I was kind of a mess. Whether it was the mascara all over my under eyes, or the fact that he knew I would soon regret letting my depression allow me to cut my thick ass curly jew-fro up to my shoulders — he knew. He patted me on the shoulders, said it looked great, and walked away. Like parents do when you come home with an attendance award — the “nice job!” that they give you to just make you feel better, when you really didn’t accomplish anything after all.

I tossed and turned all night thinking of how I yelled at that poor girl over the gift card. I thought about how she may be thinking about it too, feeling bad for the girl who was clearly freaking out about her mom dying.

The next morning, I woke up and went to Dunkin’ Donuts. (Where all trendy girls who work at expensive hair salons obviously get their coffee from.) I, myself, do not drink coffee, but I imagined she would because she is trendy and wore all black with thick eyeliner and worked at a hair salon. I panicked and asked for creamer and 20 sugars on the side.

I was going to apologize. This girl needed to know that I am not the type of person who causes a fit in the middle of an expensive ass hair salon.

When I walked in, she was right there. When she saw me it was like she saw a ghost.

I told her I was so sorry — those three words that seemed to plague my entire existence.

She told me not to worry about it, she felt awful. I told her not to worry about it, this was all me. She told me no — it’s ok she understood. We were those two drunk girls in the bathroom of a bar telling each other how much we loved each other. She ended up not being a coffee drinker, but appreciated the gesture.

I have never stepped foot in that salon again. Not just because of the embarrassment I still feel 7 years later and not because it reminds me of my dead mother — but because in what world am I paying $350 fucking dollars for a mediocre at best hair cut? And a haircut, that did in fact, did make me look like Mrs. Potato Head. I don’t know if I believe in heaven or hell or any of that — but if there is something, I’d like to think my mom is somewhere, waiting to tell me that she told me so.