I am not saying my husband, the Carpenter, isn’t observant, but if I were to suddenly have a third eye appear in the centre of my forehead, with gaudy blue eyeshadow and one giant fake eyelash blinking directly at him, he still wouldn’t notice something was amiss. I can prove it, and I will, because I know he likes to tell people in the community that all my stories about him are lies. Lies? Nobody believes him. This is why.
A recent hair consultation with my long-time hair stylist has resulted in a life-altering modification to my physical appearance; probably one of the hardest decisions I’ve made all year. Brace yourselves. I have decided to try to grow out my bangs. Gasp. Yep.
If you know, you know.
For the next few weeks, I have to figure out how a simple fringe of hair can literally divide my face in half and make me look one day like Alfalfa from The Little Rascals (remember?) and the next, Rob Smith from The Cure. This simple change is about as dramatic as my emotions about it (please don’t make eye contact with me in the grocery store until I have my lack of bangs sorted).
This is what happens when I tell my hairstylist that I am bored with my hair, but also that I don’t want to do anything too drastic that will require product, hot styling tools, cool styling tools, time or effort. If I have to work that hard, I’m not going to do it. She knows this is true, because she has been my hair stylist (and therapist) for 18 years. She could blackmail me with the stories I’ve shared in her chair, but she won’t because what’s said in the chair stays in the chair. Every four weeks I have a hair-therapy session. She listens to my tall tales while she colours my white roots, so we can all pretend my hair is mahogany red (play along regardless of bangs.)
My trusted hair stylist suggested one quick solution: to reshape my face with bangs that would divide at my left-hand part. Simple. Non-committal. Try it and see.
The Tuesday night of this pivotal change, I returned home to find the Carpenter making dinner. The oven was loaded with pots bubbling and steam rising. He was following a recipe like he was reading the plans for an underground vault. He barely looked up at me. He thrives at focusing on one thing at a time. I respect that; I envy it really. I gave him a pass.
Hours later, he still hadn’t made mention of my new look. Sometimes, I noticed he looked at me sideways, but in our relationship that subtle gesture could mean so many things, from his irritation that I’m making too much noise munching on potato chips, to wondering if I just heard him pass gas, to the possibility that he wants to say something about something but has decided to say nothing about anything because it’s safer. Like, “did you lose your bangs?” Because what if he’s wrong? Because what if I have my finger on the lever in the floor of the Earth that will swallow him up whole if he’s wrong?
Twenty-four hours pass. The Carpenter says nothing about this significant life change. Forty-eight hours pass. Still nothing. He is reading this right now. Wink.
