Megan Shubert

I got waxed today and thought about an essay I wrote a long time ago

Into the Back Room

            Women have been going through the painstaking process of achieving beauty for centuries. Most of the processes are painful, tedious and repetitive. Hair removal has been tested, modified, and refined to be as quick and painful as possible. Waxing can be an awkward, excruciating, inhumane experience but with careful planning and execution it can be less so.

            Finding an advantageous waxing saloon is key to a successful experience. To find one, it can be googled as “nail saloon (your area)”. Nail saloons usually have a back room with a small blue stereo playing soothing music such as Enya. Prices are a key indicator for how good a place is, in the Inland Empire anything less than seventeen dollars should be considered suspicious for a combination of eyebrow and lip waxing.

            Once a house of pain has been located, drive to said location and open up the door that will have wind chimes to announce your arrival. If the waxing associate/nail associates are busy be prepared to wait above five minutes for existence to be acknowledged. If you do not give the courtesy of letting them acknowledge you first then you will be treated as if you are swine and a waste of air. Also, be prepared to be acknowledged then still wait above five minutes to actually be helped. When you are acknowledged state the reason you have intruded on their territory, state your purpose as quickly as possible.

            You will be taken to a small dark room with a single dentist light hanging ominously above the head of a massage table. The light will outline where you place your head. They will tell you to lay down and possibly to take off your shoes. You will lay down, close your eyes, and prepare for pain. Sometimes the wax women will smell strongly of the Vietnamese food she just ingested and on a rare glorious occasion she will have a beautiful aroma from the ten dollar perfume she just bought from the corner store.

            The touch of her fingers on your skin will bring you back to reality after your thoughts have drifted far enough from the pain ahead. The woman will begin to spread the wax across the unwanted hair. She will then press a piece of thick cloth paper across the wax and push down for approximately five seconds. As she rubs her fingers across the cloth you will be in a state of apprehension and fear, this is understandable. Then suddenly, without warning, she will rip the cloth violently from your flesh. You may grimace, whimper, the lady might politely ask if you’re okay but she really doesn’t care.

            After repeatedly getting wax, hair, and possibly some flesh removed from your face you will still be in slight throbbing pain. Your skin will become red, inflamed, and irritable to the touch. Immediately after the sadistic torture has ceased, the woman will place a mirror into your hands. Take the mirror, give her assurance that it is a good job (regardless of it is or not) and say thank you while smiling as your face burns redder.

            Now the hardest part comes, you sit up, lace up, and walk into the florescent lights of the nail saloon. The lights will emphasize your red inflamed skin, but it’s nothing they haven’t seen before. It is the walk of shame as everyone stares upon the perfect red outlines of where your unwanted hair used to be. The person up front will eagerly be waiting for your beauty payment. As your drive home you will take slight glances into the rearview mirror and possibly swear, “never again”.

            The process of being waxed is brutal but it is necessary to achieve societal standards of beauty. Through these steps and clarifications the process of removing unwanted facial hair might be less treacherous. The window in the nail saloon window might haunt you, “Thank You, Come Again!”, because you have to and you will.

(Source: meganshubert)