Chapter two
“Ancient tragedy is loss of life, modern tragedy is loss of purpose”
I’m squeezing the scalp tight around her temples, a grip strong enough to cut the blood supply off to the brain—if I were to simply apply that same pressure to her throat. I pull that tension back and watch the foamy liquid drain from her hair; the tea tree oil hits the steam of the hot water and makes my eyes well up from the menthol quality of the shampoo. After a crisscross pattern of scrubbing the scalp with my fingertips, I twirl all of her medium-length, fine, brown hair into a bun and slowly increase the tension. Like wringing out a dishrag—I twist until I can see the skin of the forehead respond to the tightness of my grip and then I release it slowly.
If you pull enough hair at once the tension creates a pleasurable feeling, relaxing, euphoric, and intimate. This is contrasted sharply by the pain you can cause by yanking at a single strand. The fine-line that separates pain from pleasure is simply a few strands of hair, a degree that mimics the comedy of life. I envied anyone feeling pleasure. I would look on in amazement at the many faces of ecstasy; their eyes slowly close like they were taking the very first bite of chocolate cake. I was taught to think of life as a period of time dedicated to maximizing pleasure, which is exactly what most of us are sold. Life’s cultural sales pitch opens like a trifold, vacation pamphlet. The panorama of an exotic, pristine beach, the inference that we should share the view with an ideal partner, one that exudes enviable sex appeal. Destinations that are anything but pleasurable because of what the ad forgets to mention: the hordes of other people also seeking pleasure without effort.
Pleasure was something that I wanted because I thought that I lacked it. I looked down at this person now, her eyes closed, a slight grin from the pampering of a well-orchestrated scalp massage, knowing that all of this was contrived; that the pleasure she felt was superficial—that my touch would make her husband’s feel cold. Because more than pleasure, we desire novelty—even if it’s the same touch—we want a different hand. Californians will travel halfway around the world for the same sand, ocean, and view but from a more “exotic” angle. Watching her face contort from varying degrees of euphoria makes me question whether I had ever felt this good, and if I hadn’t was it because I simply hadn’t ever felt that bad?
A student pipes in—taking me away from my prolonged, existential query—reminding me that I had an audience. "How long should we shampoo and condition for?" To me, this interruption cancels the old adage: no such thing as a stupid question. I look at the circle of five students gathered for a “shampoo workshop”, assessing what kind of answer would be best for this specific group.
“That depends on how important tipping is to you”.
I pause to allow reflection, to build curiosity but press on:
“If you hate money then get it over with.” I linger on that thought because in our culture it is an absurdity to denigrate profit. “To be honest, If you are here just because you didn’t want to go to ‘real school’ and you aren’t interested in building a clientele, then I would say skip this step altogether, blow dry them, sell them some shitty, overpriced hair product and line up the next one.”
I'm feeling the flow of a rant coming on, finding my cadence of instruction through contention with an industry that I am attempting to identify myself away from.
“In reality, no one gives a fuck about how well you actually cut hair. But if you can, for five to ten minutes get your client to forget about their stale life, their petulant children or drudgery of marriage and their daily monotony, then you will have a follower, one, that you more than likely can’t get rid of”.
I think about the life/work balance that we are sold but that doesn’t actually exist and decide to share my thought, “Essentially, building a clientele is like building a cult; you need to believe in what you are selling, just enough to get others to buy-in. And once they do, it will be too late to control the direction of your life. You will become dependent on the High Street fashion that you only wear to have the appearance of success in the first place; the lure you use to advertise: “I am worth money, so pay me the money”. A shiny piece of metal and a sinker that we dangle to others because we already swallowed the hook. You buy so you can sell, what you don’t realize is that you have been sold a trap. This industry and probably every industry for that matter is an elaborate Chinese finger trap, you do a certain thing in order to get a certain thing, when you try to pull away, you realize you will have to destroy everything you stuck your fingers in order to escape.”
I’ve had a rough morning so I crescendo:
“Your cult members will show up every 6-8 weeks ready to tell you about their generic existence. They’ll emphasize their drama-filled life, talk about personal relationships that you couldn’t care less about, they might even compliment you on your new Prada car shoes, and you will humor them with a false sense of interest and a patented fake laugh that will make it easier for them to pay you because they feel like they are just supporting a buddy”.
I feel her eyelids flick open. She’s laying back in this dimly lit room, adorned with an iridescent, mosaic tile, enjoying her discounted hair service that I am rudely interrupting with the reality of commerce. My comment just broke the illusion that I was doing this because I care about her or that I have an interest in her well-being. I have revealed my cynicism. I can feel her regret as her eyes burn a hole through me so I look down and smile like I have rehearsed to do. She is probably wondering how she could get so much pleasure from a person she has quickly learned to despise—welcome to the beauty school version of hate-fucking.
Students are looking at each other now, either amused—if they know me—or terrified because they just realized their tuition got them me. Real education is based on fundamental truths, but the truth does not sell well; an education in selling—especially in selling yourself—is based on deceit. We can be honest with people we love and people we hate but we reserve polite, dishonest ambiguity for everyone in between—for the customers, the consumers. The less I care—about my reputation, my ego—the more honest I become. The more I care—about my well-being, my future, the people I want around me—the more honest I become. The more honest, the freer. The more I want to sell, my stuff, my skills, myself, the better I get at lying. Truth is a sharp knife that identifies a dotted line; it is simply up to us to press firmly down on the blade and sever the lies.
Working as an educator for the biggest company in the beauty industry off the main street in Santa Barbara, California, fill my days with these experiences. Despite my attitude, I give practical, real-world advice. Some might see this as trying to convince others to take up a different profession; I don’t deny the accusation. My disdain has many factors; one comes from watching 20-somethings clutter up my industry because cosmetology on the surface is a hobby with potential income. But this act is only to keep busy for as long as it takes to become a “kept spouse”. Their real drive in life is to find a successful mate. They are living out an everyday reality show, like The Bachelor but with mediocre looking people. It took me years to be taken seriously—mostly by those closest to me—so watching others further entrench the profession into a cliché is unnerving.
The other—inevitably larger factor—is that I feel stuck in the middle of non-accomplishment; not failure, not a success, just space-cruising through my late twenties with no relevance. I realize that this is entitlement. I have more skill, knowledge, and experience than those more successful than me, but I don’t have the reflection that they do in the material sense. I don’t have cars, houses, or recognition that I think I deserve. I blame it on an invented moral superiority or the “integrity” of my art. I am frustrated because I know this is wrong, and I know it is going to hurt to “unlearn”.
I have a preternatural sense for students who have real aspirations. I give what I can or at least as much help as I can muster; which usually involves a sidecar of verbal abuse. The real world is brutal to the “artistic type”, so my teachings are just foreplay. One of my consistent lessons is to always take advantage of the opportunity to learn. On the surface, this sounds fine but I predicate the advice on a controversial premise. I tell them to take advantage of the waiver that is signed acknowledging that students are not liable for mistakes.
“Fuck their hair up on purpose, you are paying for an education, you might as well get a real one”.
I give insidious ideas of “accidentally” mixing incorrect color formulations, ash tones blended with warm blondes, I persuade them to try using a flat iron on hair that has lightener in a foil—magnificent, aesthetic terrorism.
“The real art,” I pause for dramatic effect, “is in convincing them of your vision. You are an artist not a fast-food, drive up! Don’t you dare take orders, you are not a menu!” You can do whatever you want in this life, as long as you convince others of your art. That “art” can be hair, hedge funds or even single-bid contracts for the privatization and profiteering of the “War on Terror”.
I am Jack’s La Résistance, just a modern-day freedom fighter. This, of course, is strictly frowned upon, which only changes the volume with which I give it and to whom I give it—not the message itself. My sentiment is genuine, it’s how I learned a precise skill. I had to destroy before I could create. The sooner a student recognizes the need for mastery of a skill, the sooner they can ditch the rules in order to create something of their own. If nothing else, the art of hairdressing has taught me the value of capability. An investment in your own ability has infinite returns, even if at this very moment I feel existentially bankrupt.
Despite my hope for a few, it is a scheme that I am a part of. They are charging $25k for 1700 hours of education, and thanks to financial aid students can “afford it”, not realizing how much hair sweeping it will take to pay it back with interest. On top of this, the school charges a premium for services that are then handed down to the students to perform; who are doing the work and receiving exactly zero compensation. It was a system that I fell victim to, and now have the confounding problem of also participating in from the other side. The hundred million dollar company that employs me makes a profit on both ends, and also has the nerve to encourage a donation to their new charity Giving Back is the New Black, no doubt a profitable tax write-off.
Our society has made it so difficult to learn a trade that it has regulated learning skills that one could quite easily teach themselves in a few short weeks, and most students have to anyways. I spent years after Hair School unfucking the education they gave so that I could actually make money in my trade. But the racket is so obvious that it goes on. Hairdressing companies saw that if they federally regulated the industry it would legally require anyone that desired to be in the trade to pay them in order to do it. It isn’t rocket science; clients only die metaphorically when you over-cut an inverted square layer into a quarter highlight. Perhaps this is the source of my anger, the entire structure of what I bought into is corrupt, and now—to survive—I too have to play along.
I revolt against injustice by being a wrench in the process, no real change, no real revolution—I still have to pay my rent, so I don’t really want it to burn to the ground. Instead, I find frivolous ways to rebel without the consequences of doing so. I have no problem cutting an "accidental hole" into a client's hair; she resembles the 'cat lady', a victim of plastic surgery addiction. She is so obviously obsessed with her appearance but must lack the use of an actual mirror. It makes me wonder how many of us look into our reflection but don’t see. I feel like a baby frightened at the sight of her injected lips could tell her just how dishonest she is with herself. I hand the sheers back to the student with a smile and tell her to work it out. Before walking away I attempt to build her confidence by reminding her that 'disconnections are all the rage right now'. Fuck this place.
Despite my attitude, in my eight years of the beauty industry I have experienced some success, especially in print work, both as a hairdresser, make-up artist, and also with some paying photography jobs. Commonly, the best paying jobs are ‘cattle calls’, what modeling agencies use to supplement their income off the universal hope that parents have: the idea that they gave birth to a star, the next Kate Moss. All parents somehow wish this industry upon their kids, thinking that their home-taught Christian values would defend them from the attraction of a coke habit, or the lure of making a quick buck by posing for porn. We subject our children to predators and are then dismayed when we hear the news of their downfall.
Like most people, I have what I imagine to be an elevated sense of right and wrong, but I have no doubt pushed the bar of my own integrity. Strangely, my only advancements come from relinquishing some mild ethical value. I haven’t committed a crime per se, but nodding along while a modeling agent tells a tall, skinny 16-year-old girl that she has a chance in Milan seems like it is pushing it. Her overly excited mother will pay for a photoshoot, as well as the make-up and hair required for it and I have bills to pay.
I have tear sheets from national and international publications, nominations for awards with photography in hairdressing. I am an active master of my craft—not the best, but the potential to be—and for whatever reason, I lack the motivation to continue. Instead, I settled on a humble, salary position because it allows me the arrogance and platform in which to preach how NOT to do it and to also leaves room to excuse missing out on my own potential. The education industry and its teachers are at the forefront of personal failure but teach the opposite.
Complacency is torture, the fact that I have become what I hate makes waking up each day feel like a special, systemic, unresolved pain. My boss knows this too. Jennifer is a friend and the only one in whom I confide in my frustration. This leaves her predictably suspicious. She was wary from the start, probably even before she hired me. She can clearly see that I have my finger on the ejection button, that I am volatile, a passenger who has no plans of making the final destination. She is either just as frustrated as I am, or a fan of the fireworks that are bound to ensue from hiring a Jihadi-hairdresser.
We all attempt to pacify an unfulfilling existence. Given that I live in an extremely wealthy college town, alcohol and a promiscuous nightlife seem to be the drugs of choice. Regardless, they are an attempt to fill a void. My way to deal with the void is to circle it by pedaling a bike as hard and as long as I can tolerate it. I’m not shy about admitting to my addiction, it feels like a human need to escape. The hills surrounding Santa Barbara provide a terrain in which I can transform my attitude, punish my transgressions, and physically cause the pain that my choices bestow on me. But my honesty shines through: it is another form of chemical dependence, just one that is produced and satisfied endogenously.
I can ride from sea level to 5000-feet of elevation in a daily routine of self-flagellation, see parts of the world that very few others will, and most importantly, in a few hours, overwrite my longing for a better life. Somewhere along the way, the sweat from my brow produced by the energy expenditure of forwarding propulsion will mix with the tears of a disappointing life. They will hit the ground at the same time, and no one looking on will discern the difference—I’m not even sure that I can.
I wasn’t always this miserable, in fact, I used to enjoy my profession, my time—I encouraged the hopeful conceit that changing your hair can change your life. I enjoyed the people; I loved the trade and the exhibition of skill. My demeanor, it turns out, is just the consequence of being introduced to a simple idea just a few short months ago.
