Twenty-Four
DeeDee
NEAT: a liquor that is served undiluted and unaccompanied by anything else
I tip back the last sip of my drink where I’m sitting in a very hipster coffee shop a few blocks away from Taverne Toulouse. I’ve been in here typing away on my laptop for so many hours my fingers are sore. I’m all jumpy and shaky from having two iced lattes and one lemonade, and I’m sure the staff here think I’m a maniac, but if I don’t get this all done in one go, I know I’ll chicken out and put it off until it’s too late.
Applications for the fall term at Cheveluxe close on June fifteenth.
As in, today.
My details are all submitted. My statement of experience has been uploaded. I’ve paid the fee. I just need to attach my letter of intent, and I’ll be done.
I hover my mouse over the ‘Save File’ button.
Click it. Just click it.
My finger starts shaking from more than just the caffeine.
“Merde,” I curse under my breath before opening the document to read it one last time.
I’ve read it ‘one last time’ five times already. Even though it’s written in French, I’ve still run it through a grammar checker twice. I could probably recite it off by heart at this point, but I scan the words again.
Dear Admissions Officer,
The first time I dyed my hair, I was fourteen. My maman helped me pick out a drugstore combo pack of bleach and blonde dye. It came with one of those really low quality highlighting caps that ripped as soon as we opened it. We taped it back up and put it on my head, tying it under my neck like a plastic bonnet. My maman sat there for half an hour, pulling pieces of my hair through the little holes with a crochet hook.
Then we put the dye on, and there was no going back.
I spent that whole year of my life looking like I dumped a pile of spaghetti on top of my head. I had all these skinny little bright blonde noodle streaks on top of dark brown hair. It was like frosted tips, but worse.
I had never been happier.
That’s the thing about hair: when it comes down to it, it doesn’t matter how it looks. It doesn’t matter if your bob isn’t the right shape for your face, or if strawberry blonde ‘isn’t your colour,’ or if you’re really not the kind of person who should have gotten a crew cut. (Side note: is anyone the kind of person who should get a crew cut?) It doesn’t matter if you keep rocking a middle part no matter how many people tell you it’s not cool. It doesn’t matter if you want bangs that are ‘so totally not in this season.’ It doesn’t matter if you want to razor cut your waist-length hair and give yourself a big old skunk stripe like it’s 2009 and emo kids still exist.
It’s not about the cut or the colour or the products or the style; it’s about the way you feel when you walk out the door to take on the world. It’s about confidence, intention, and ownership. Whether we want it to or not, our hair says something about us. Just like clothes and makeup, our hair sends a message. Hair can be heard, and there’s nothing quite like the power of knowing your hair says exactly what you want it to say.
When I first showed up at school with my spaghetti highlights, I felt like I was the shit. I don’t know if we’re allowed to swear in these letters, but that’s what it was like to walk into my classroom and be the only girl who’d ever dyed her hair permanently. I’d flip it over my shoulders and say, “Oh actually, it’s permanent,” when kids asked if I was wearing clip-ins. I pretended like it was no big deal, but it was the first time in my life that I felt like I was really seen as the person I wanted to be and knew I was inside.
I spent a lot of my childhood feeling alone and powerless. I watched a lot of important people in my life walk out of it at a very young age, and if I’m being truly honest, I’ve spent a lot of my adulthood feeling alone and powerless too. That first dye job was a way for me to find my power. It was a way for me to have control when it felt like everything was falling apart. It was a way for me to remind myself that I was still me and I still mattered, even when other people seemed to forget.
I dyed my hair pink when I was sixteen, and it’s been some shade of pink ever since.
Some days, I wear my pink hair like it’s a billboard. It’s everything I try to be in the eyes of everyone else: bold, bright, and exciting. Pink hair screams fun, and there are always going to be people looking for fun. Having people around has been important to me for a very long time. I thought being noticeable and intriguing was what drew me to the colour. I thought all I wanted was to stand out as the ‘fun girl,’ but I’ve been thinking about it for a while, and now I know that’s not totally true.
Having pink hair is kind of like wearing my heart on my sleeve. I could have picked electric blue or bright green. They would have had the same effect, but I went with pink, and I think that’s because of how vulnerable pink can be. Pink is the colour we use to express love. Pink is the colour we use to lay it all on the line, and maybe I was ready to let my hair say something about me way before I was ready to say it myself. Maybe all the searching for fun and adventure was really about searching for something much rarer and much more precious.
And maybe, when I look in the mirror and see a girl with hair the colour of roses and candy and blushing cheeks staring back at me, maybe I will be ready to give myself all the love I need. Maybe I will be ready to open my arms to that rare and precious thing and find it all on my own.
I want to study at Cheveluxe because I think that maybe, just maybe, I’m meant to give that gift to other people too—even if it comes in the form of a crew cut.
Sincerely,
Dénise ‘DeeDee’ Beausoleil
“Sacrement.”
I tap my fingers on the wooden, mug-stained tabletop as I try to decide if I should cut the ‘DeeDee’ part. I didn’t put Dénise at all to begin with—it feels too weird to sign a letter that’s all about being myself with the name even my mom doesn’t call me—but that’s what I had to use for the application, and I don’t want to confuse anybody.
They’re probably going to be confused by this whole letter. I don’t know what they were looking for in a ‘letter of intention,’ but I don’t think it was this.
I didn’t know what else to write. I tried and tried to come up with something formal about techniques and skill building, but it all sounded like bullshit. It was bullshit. When I think about why I want to go to hairdressing school, it’s not so I can become fancy enough to cut hair for celebrities or work in a super expensive salon.
It’s so I can give people something that makes them feel good. It’s so I can feel good about being me.
I tap my fingers on the table for a couple more minutes before letting out a long breath.
“Ҫa suffit,” I order myself. “It’s done.”
I click back to the application portal and find the ‘Save File’ button again. Then I glance down to the clock in the bottom corner of the screen.
Okay. One more minute, and I will send it.
I hover my finger over the mouse pad.