Hey, it was either her ego or my head.
I could feel her fear as she slowly moved the clippers, skimming the surface of my hair. With each pass, I could hear the individual strands of hair being severed. It sounded like a few others were merely being injured in the process.
I’d given clear, concise instructions: “Clippers. Number four on the sides and back, then blend it in.”
The woman who regularly cut my hair was on maternity leave, so I’d been assigned a replacement. I sensed the fresh-out-of-beauty-school aura about her. Timid movements. Overly meticulous combing. A lot of leaning in and squinting.
After about fifteen minutes, she’d done a fine job on top, but when she snapped the clipper switch to ON, I tensed up, tightened my grip on the chair.
I leaned away from her: “Is that the number four?”
“Yes, sir. Anything fun planned for this weekend?”
Well, shit, yes — but depending on what she’d be doing to my head, my plans may have to change.
I could barely feel the clippers back there, then on either side. Bravely, with all the hope I could muster, I said, “If you’ve got the number four on there, go for it.” I felt compelled to offer her a little confidence and quickly realized how stupid a move that was.
She said, “I don’t want to do it all at once.”
I sighed and looked at the clock.
Rather than have this be my first haircut to be completed in several phases over a week’s time, I said, “If you’re not comfortable, please get someone else.”
She disappeared and returned with the owner, a short stocky woman with a maniacal, high-pitched laugh that always seemed to be moving about the place, keeping close watch over her kingdom. The owner asked what I needed. I repeated my instructions and grabbed a comb, clippers, and shears. As she traveled ’round my head with a confident, gentle ferocity, she described out loud what she was doing for the benefit of the new woman.
For the next fifteen miunutes, I was the mannequin head at the beauty school. I just sat there and took it. I didn’t want to speak any more. I’d been there long enough.
In the end the new woman thanked me for my patience, and I walked out with a good looking head of hair. Unfortunately, I had to go through good deal of fear-smelling and fear-feeling to get there.
As customers, we sometimes get that sense we’re at the mercy of companies or service providers. And sometimes, just because we want to be nice, we accept what they give us and how they treat us. At each juncture, however, we have a choice. We can let it keep happening or speak the hell up.
If you can’t run and forget about it without the risk of looking like some freak donning a REDKEN® poncho, stand up and say something before you lose your pretty little head. Then you can blog about it in public without having to wear a hat.
This evening, as I watched The Incredibles with my daughter, I was struck by the scene where Bob Parr (Mr. Incredible) is reprimanded by his boss, Mr. Huph. These few moments of dialogue characterize the ongoing struggle between corporations who have no desire to relinquish brand control and consumers who are simply taking more and more of it each and every time they jump online.
After seeing a dumb Alka-Seltzer spot this evening, wherein the revived tablet-wearing icon, “Speedy,” fist-bumps some office chick with a cold, I jumped online to find the aberration and give it a piece of my mind.
