Hair today, Proust tomorrow

Sometimes people think I am shallow. You'll agree or disagree depending on where, when and how you know me. A couple of random quotes to illustrate the "shallow" hypothesis:

Kim: "When did you become so shallow?" (2004)

Early Bird: "When Theresa first started working in magazines she was an intellectual hippie from Grahamstown, but look how shallow she´s become!" (2006)

In 2005 Mim gave me a hair-straightener for my birthday. I was delighted with the present, and had painstakingly straightened locks for a month or so; then I shaved all my hair off. I also demanded (and received) the box set of In Search of Lost Time for Christmas - to pacify my pseudo-intellectual side. My hair has since grown back. And I´m only halfway through The Guermantes Way. But reading this poem, first brought to my attention by Early Bird, makes me feel better.

Anyway, while I was in London, my dear friend Caramello gave me a very generous voucher for my birthday. And it's not all about hair and lipstick, so I was glad it was for Waterstone's rather than The Bodyshop. A list of my purchases follows.

1. Complicity
Iain Banks
GX and I have a running argument as to whether Iain Banks or Iain M Banks is the better writer. Considering I have read only the former, and GX only the later, it's never gonna be settled until one of us becomes less precious about our selection of reading material.
2. Odd Girl Out
Anne Bannon
The first lesbian pulp fiction novel. Despite the wimpy main character and surprising lack of sex scenes, it's still a classic.
3. The Road to Oxiana
Robert Byron
The original Bruce. Byron is the hero of my hero, which makes him a super hero.
4. The Princess Bride
William Goldman
An epic tale of "true love and high adventure". I never tire of it.
5. Atomised
Michel Houellebecq
I revelled in discovering Houellebecq. But honestly, there´s only so much of ageing Frenchmen fucking hot young things that one can take before it begins to pall.
6. Confessions of Zeno
Italo Svevo
Actually the book I bought was called Zeno's Conscience, but I prefer the translation above. I first came across this novel through William Kentridge's opera, and have spent years searching for my own copy after UCT library rudely demanded I return the one that belonged to them, as well as issuing me with a hefty library fine. The book sits by my bed for the day or night when I am inspired to give up smoking. Until such a time, I am a devotee of the last-cigarette ritual.

'To reduce its outlandish appearance, I even tried to give a philosophical content to the last-cigarete disease. Striking a beautiful attitude, one says: "Never again." But what becomes of that attitude if the promise is then kept? It´s possible to strike the attitude only when you are obliged to renew the vow.'
pp 13 to 14

Right, it's 1:.29am on 27.03.08, hardly an auspicious date to give up smoking. So I'm off for a "last cigarette" before bed.

Hairy Tales II: Judys Hair

Naturally, I was delighted to discover that there was a hairdressers, Salon Birgit, attached to the Hotel Schlössle, my accomodation in Vaduz. However, I was somewhat less delighted to discover it would cost CHF86 for a simple cut and dry. This was roughly the same amount I´d paid for all the stripping, dying, cutting, washing and drying I´d had done at H.A.N.D. And I even had a head massage thrown in.

I resolved to get my hair cut more cheaply when I was in London. Walking to the station in New Malden one fine afternoon, I happened to chance upon Judys Hair. There was a notice in the window saying ladies' haircuts cost £24*, and I was in there like a flash.

The only problem was, the hairdresser was no Beauty. She didn´t know what I wanted; I didn´t know what I wanted; and the result was a presentable trim, but not what I would call a haircut. Granted, there was no longer the possibility of an unwanted mullet sprouting forth from my skull, but that was the best that could be said about it.

I continued the walk down to the station, the customary post-haircut spring in my step strangely absent. Out of the corner of my eye I spyed Sam´s Barbershop. I learned something that day. Never trust a hairdresser who can´t apostrophise. How can someone incapable of constructing a correct sentence, or in this case, phrase, be trusted with the inifinitely more finicky task of creating a proper hairstyle? I couldn´t help thinking I should´ve rather gone to Sam´s, and shaved my head again. If his grammar is anything to go by, at least he would´ve made a decent job of it.

* Trying to convert between francs, euro and pounds (and with those pesky rands demanding to be taken account of also) was, and still is, beyond my elementary mathematics. On that particular trip to England, I later found out that the CHF/£ exchange rate at the time was something like 2.3/1. I had been innocently working on a 2/1 ratio (don´t you just love whole numbers!), so didn´t save as much on the haircut as I originally supposed.

Hairy Tales I: a work of Beauty

Hair is very important to me. Which isn´t to say I don´t shave mine all off with some degree of frequency. But this means finding a good hairdresser is vital; my hair is perennially growing out, and needs to be skilfully coaxed towards the desired level of chic(k)ness.

Before I left Cape Town, I was fortunate enough to work for a company where everyone understood this hairy imperative. I don´t know if it was official policy, but in our corner of the office it was perfectly acceptable, even encouraged, to take an extra-long lunch break to get your hair cut, as long as we weren´t actually on deadline.

Witness my last haircut before I left. We´d just finished the nine o´clock meeting, when I casually mentioned I was thinking of dying my hair chocolate brown.
"Chocolate brown," my editor enthused. "That will look fabulous. You must do it. Make an appointment for today!"
"Ja, well," I hesitated, disingenuously. "I have a long list today, and we´re going to print next week. Perhaps the week after that?"
"Nonsense," she countered. "Call your hairdresser right away. You can have an extra-long lunch."

A few hours later, I waltzed into H.A.N.D in Green Point. Luckily Beauty, my favourite hairdresser in the whole world, had a free slot. The truth is, I´m not actually that picky when it comes to my hair. I´m not going to bring in some picture of this week´s latest celebrity haircut, and demand to look exactly like Katie Holmes or Posh Spice, or whoever. I mean, why would I want to look like Katie Holmes, or Posh Spice, or whoever? I just want to look like me. But it is beyond my limited linguistic skills to explain what "me" is hairstyle-wise, especially since I don´t really know myself. In true passive-aggressive style, I want my hairdresser to access my subconscious; analyse my bone stucture and hair type; and come up with the precise haircut I desire, without me having to actually tell her what it is.

Beauty can do all of these things, which is why I love and miss her. On this particular occasion she stripped my hair of its previous redness, applied a gorgeous chocolate-brown dye, and rounded off the effect with a haircut that was the frigging shiznic. Everyone in the office was so dazzled by my transformation they failed to comment on the fact that this time it had been an extra-extra-long lunch.