Larger-than-life beauty shops may occupy
the Hollywood set, but in South Philadelphia , it’s all about getting real. And
there’s no better place to get real than in the beauty shop
mirror.
I came hair-first into the world some thirty-five
years ago, with a full head of dark locks. Today, my brown waves
are corkscrewed by a permanent, a fact I only reveal after someone
says, “You
must love having naturally curly hair.” To which I reply,
modestly running a hand through my curls, “Actually, I love
having a dad who is a hairdresser.” Inevitably, the commentator’s
eyes widen, “Does he do your hair?” I reply, “Naturally!”
I spend my share of time at my father’s salon, or “the
shop,” as it’s known in my family. In 1968, my father
started his business, which bears the eponymous name of Louis’ Hairstyling.
It’s in the heart of South Philadelphia , the terrain of
strong women with smoky voices who know the importance of raising
good kids, rolling great meatballs, and visiting the hairdresser
weekly for style and gossip.
Among my father’s clients, it is these tough-and-tender
women that I remember seeing in his styling chair through the years.
They pinched my cheeks when I was small and watched me grow up.
Today, when I visit the shop, I’m still Daddy’s little
girl. “Is this the older one, Lou?” asks a woman wearing
a pink housedress, as my father wraps her hair around pinker curlers. “Yes,
I am,” I pipe up as I pull off my coat. “She got big,
Lou,” says the lady in the housedress, peering at my reflection
in the shop’s wall-length mirror. “How old is she now?” “Almost
thirty-five,” I answer. “I remember you when you were
this high,” she says, lowering one pink-nailed hand to a
foot from the ground. She smiles, and so do I.
With her dyed-brown hair rolled up, she soon is flipping through Woman’s
Day while the dryer’s plastic dome hums above her.
I settle into a vinyl waiting chair and watch my father at work
on his next customer.
Like an artist at the easel, he stands behind
one of his two brown styling chairs, a black rattail comb jutting
from the front left pocket of his jeans. He slips out the comb
and lifts his scissors, arms akimbo. In the chair is a woman
in her early fifties with short hair the color of cotton. She
holds her reading glasses in her right hand as my father snips
and trims. Looking into the mirrored wall, she talks to my father’s
reflection of her husband, her children, an upcoming party, a
neighbor who just passed away. My father nods distracted assent,
still snipping, her hair falling like white rain at his feet.
Just when it seems he cannot possibly be listening, he looks
at her in the mirror and jumps back two
steps to ask about the party, to comment
on the neighbor, and to laugh as he tells a story about the woman’s
husband and children. I shake my head in wonder.
My father picks up a tube-shaped brush with
bristles all around. He twirls the snow-white hair around the
brush, securing a tight, wavy style with a hairdryer. He hoists
a can of hairspray and briefly encircles the client in a foggy
aura. The client raises a small purple mirror and spins around
in the chair to assess the back of her hairstyle, while my father
whisks excess hair from her neck with the soft, baby-powdered
bristles of a wooden shaving brush. “Thanks,
Lou,” she says, and moves to the phone to call her husband
to pick her up.
Next to me in the waiting chairs are two
women, about sixty-five and forty-five, passing the time swapping
stories and recipes. “I
can’t wait to get home to have my string bean and potato
salad,” says the older, lightly grey-haired woman. The younger
one, running a brush through her coarse brown hair, lets out a “Mmmmm.
. . .” “And I made some sausage last night that was
delicious,” the older woman continues. “I'll just cut
it up and throw it in! What a dinner.”
My father waves me into the styling chair.
He disappears briefly into the shop’s wood-paneled back room, where high shelves
hold bottles of hair dye and other potions. He emerges with the
frothy solution for my permanent. I watch in the mirror as he twists
my hair into permanent rods, orange and blue and yellow. I notice
that his moustache is graying to match his salt-and-pepper hair,
which is receding to a Caesar-like crown. His brown eyes are intense
as he goes about his work, but when I talk—of my job, my
son, our family—he pauses, a sheaf of hair between his fingers.
He catches my eyes in the mirror and listens intently.
Another customer—hair dyed black, shaded eyeglasses defining
her face—watches my father’s reflection as he rolls
my hair into a colorful mountain of plastic rods. “Is this
the nurse?” she asks my father. “Jennifer’s the
writer,” my father says. “My younger daughter is the
nurse.” He glances up into the mirror, flashing a quick smile
at the waiting customer, who says, “You must be very proud
of them.” “You bet I am!” my father replies. “I'm
proud of both my girls.” Now his smile is reflected at me.
Along the length of the wooden countertop among the thick-bristled
brushes and slim bottles of hair gel, stand photos of my sister
and me in our pre-pubescent bob cuts, curls teased big during our
teens, and finally our bridal upsweeps.
On my wedding day, my father had sculpted my hair into an intricate
bun that
nestled inside the beaded crown of my bridal
veil. Many of my father’s customers were at the church. They didn’t
comment on my gown, but said instead, “Lou, I love her hair!” I
realized then that this is how my father’s love for his family
shines through. His decades of wash-and-sets and cuts-and-color
gave me a happy and secure childhood and the college education
he never had, setting me on my life’s path. Now, although
I am an adult and on my own, my father is still caring for me with
the intimate art of hairstyling.
An hour later, my hair has sprung dutifully into its curls. I
kiss my father on the cheek and pull on my coat, brushing stray
hairs from my collar. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him, reflected
in the wall-length mirror, watching me as I go out his shop door.
|
