'Twist' on my Expectations...

Went to get a free haircut as a model for a pricey salon's training in their techniques. Instead I came home with the rattiest teased hair & 50+ bobby pins, covered by a pretty little french twist. 2 miserable hours in the chair and now I get to go to bed looking like a movie star. Without the haircut I was hoping for...

The story: Weeks ago I called and got my name on a list, told them I was interested in a haircut, explained my current cut & what I was hoping for. Got a call from a stylist, scheduled to get it cut, got stuck in AR and had to cancel. Today another stylist called around noon to ask me if I was still interested and if I could come in and get my hair done tonight. Sure! Rearranged all of the evenings plans - Drew watched kids. Got there, had to park in a parking garage near downtown Fort Worth. Not terrible but not great either when you know it will be dark by the time you leave....by yourself. Anyways, so she is about 20 + minutes late to get started on my hair. Then when I sat in the chair she says, "so we're gonna do a french twist tonight". Then the trainer walks up and they begin talking about their plans for my hair. At this point I'm certain that they have absolutely no plans to cut my hair first. I tell them that I thought I was coming for a haircut...and they apologize for the miscommunication. Because I know that I am this girls 'classwork' I feel completely obligated to stay and let her do my hair. So I do. She 'back-combs' (fancy way to say 'teased') one particular section so much that I actually asked her if I was going to be able to get the tangles out. Then she has to brush most of it out and redo it because she didn't do it enough the first time. Ouch. Then they screwed up the million sections that she had to bobby pin up and they had to be redone countless times.

The whole time I was sitting there I was holding back tears of frustration and disappointment. This was not what I had signed up for. I would have never asked my husband to mess up his study night plans the night before a test so that I could go get a bedtime french twist. I was counting on a free (valued at $70) cut. To make matters much more weighty, earlier in the day I had already begun to parallel this situation to another much more important thing going on in my life and, while I wallowed in my misery, I started to fear that God might be speaking to that situation. I don't really know that that's true, but it definitely didn't help matters.

Side note: When stuff like this happens (ie - the van breaking down in OK while on vacation or a rat's nest in my hair) perspective, patience and long-suffering come by looking out for what Christ might be doing in the situation. I had a great conversation with a young woman from Nigeria who worked the front desk while I was waiting. She the youngest of five children - so we had family size in common & that got the conversation rolling. I was able to testify about how Jesus has been caring for our family. As soon as I spoke the name of Jesus she quickly began throwing out words like 'Karma' and quoting Gandhi. Understood. The conversation didn't really go anywhere after that but maybe my suffering was for her...or who knows, maybe it was really just for me.