Tuesday evening was wonderful. I’d decided it was time to get a trim since I was spending entirely too much time peeling split ends when I was supposed to be working, so after I got home after work, I rifled through my coupon box in search of local haircut discounts. I’m not loyal to any particular hairstylist or salon, so I usually just go to what I can get cheap, be it Supercuts, Fantastic Sam’s, Great Clips. This time I dug out a promotional coupon for a free haircut at a local salon (not a chain) which was in a “welcome to the neighborhood!” coupon book the City mailed me when I bought this house 7.5 years ago. No expiration date was printed on the coupon, so I called the salon and asked if they still honored it. The receptionist was amused at this coupon, since it apparently wasn’t in circulation anymore the past 6 years, and checked with the owner of the salon. The owner, Donna, said she’d honor it and asked me to be in at 6:45p. That gives me a couple of hours to feed/water my coworker’s cats (I’m cat-sitting since she’s in Vegas for a few days) and I decided to go shopping for my own dress to wear to Mr. W’s niece’s wedding this Saturday.

After shopping at a few local discount clothing stores, I decided that the problem with today’s trend is that they all look like maternity wear. Everything is high-waisted (or empire-waisted) with tons of fabric floating underneath, so that all the shirts and dresses look like babydolls. I’m short and curvy, so if you take the widest part of my chest and just drape fabric down to the widest part of my hips, I become a giant rectangle. Mr. W’s daughter is very tall and slender, so the current fashion is pretty flattering on her, making her look more fluid and less gangly. And then a thought: should I be stocking up on this unflattering fashion right now for future use AS maternity wear? Cuz with my luck, when I actually am pregnant it’ll only be hip-huggers or high-waisted bottoms and form-fitting tops in style. After trying on many many dresses that looked cute hanging there but terrible on my frame, I found myself in the discounted department store Ross. I grabbed a ton of dresses I thought might have potential and the first one I tried on was a fitted dress so amazing on me that I had to step out of the dressing room to see myself in the 3-angled mirror, in case the dressing room mirror was a freak circus elongating one. I still looked shockingly nice. I tried on the other 3 dresses I had in there, and none of them looked decent, so I was pretty sure it wasn’t the mirror. I tried on the first dress again, admired its tiny cap sleeves that surprisingly didn’t make my arms look huge, the form-fitting body that surprisingly hid my fat due to the dark brown and maroon print, the asymmetrical V-shaped skirt hem and upper-body-elongating deep V-neck, and bought it. $9.99. Even if it dissolved after I wore it it’d still be worth it. Despite the fact that Ross is notorious for its long slow lines which I did observe as I walked in, when I was ready to pay there was nobody in line. I quickly got out and made it to my hair appointment exactly on time.

Donna, the salon owner, did my hair because the other stylists working there were independent contractors renting space so she did not make them honor an outdated coupon for a free haircut. Donna asked me what I was looking for in the haircut, and I explained that my hair was entirely too long and shapeless now, and I needed a trim. Maybe about 3 inches, my wedding makeup artist had told me, so that she could still do a messy up-do for the wedding in a few months. Donna started snipping away and since we were on the topic of weddings, she mentioned that her daughter (whom she’d dragged in there to work the receptionist desk for her that day) is also engaged and was looking for a venue. So the three of us, since all the other stylists had left by this time, had a nice talk about weddings and experiences and venues. Her daughter Alison and I appeared to share the exact same brain when it came to weddings, practical and thrifty to a fault, totally non-girly, so our chat was very productive. I mentioned I happened to have my wedding binder in the car (passed on to me from Anny’s wedding), so after the shampoo I ran out to the car to grab it for Alison to examine. As Alison made photocopies of useful information in there, we talked about what a great coincidence it was that I was there, since I happened to find the coupon, Donna happened to be working, she happened to have forced Alison in to keep her company, and I happen to have the wedding binder with me. At the end of my free haircut, I tipped Donna $5 and she gave me a “new customer kit,” a mug, pencil, and coupon for $5 off my next appointment. She ended up lopping off about 5 inches, I’m a little nervous about it being up-do-able, but I love it. It’ll grow another inch and a half by the wedding.

Figure-flattering dress: $9.99
Complimentary haircut: $0.00
Looking cute, younger, and feeling like I helped someone with something she was stressed and lost about: Priceless.

Oh, and the chipmunk cheeks seem unnoticeable now, too. My original theory was that it wasn’t that my cheeks got rounder, it was that my neck got skinnier, but now I think it was the hair.