Becoming Didi

There were three Didis in the mirrors of her mother’s salon, one for each marriage. But she didn’t know all that was ahead of her as she tied the floral plastic drape around Mrs. Johnson’s heavy neck.

“There you go,” and smoothed it down along her client’s shoulders. Didi went by Della, short for Delphina in high school and was just on the verge of graduating.

“Women like us, we need a trade, Delphina,” her mother warned.

She rolled her eyes. “What kind of women are we, Mama?”

“We’re smart women, that’s what we are. You do not want to be depending on some man. They get themselves a wild idea, sniff a skirt, go off to war, or God knows what. Love is grand, but if you can do hair, you’ll be okay after the fireworks fizzle out.”

The tiny salon, wedged in between a hardware store and a dentist, had two chairs, one dryer, a sink in back with teal and white checkerboard tiles. Della did her part for her family, and for the family she dreamed of having. It felt like her life would never start.

“You want to touch up those roots before we set it again, Mrs. Johnson?” Della asked as she unraveled and combed out the collapsing bouffant.

“I want a whole new color. Red like Lucille Ball! My Wally is coming home tomorrow, he’s been away on business. I want him to think he came home to a whole new wife!” She laughed with abandon. There weren’t any men in the salon to be demure for. “Your mom let you color your hair yet?”

“Oh, no,” and shook the idea away.

“Nonsense! Look at your cheekbones, that beautiful creamy skin. I would kill for that skin. But the mousy brown isn’t attracting the boys, is it?”

“No ma’am. Boys aren’t very interested in me,” as she spritzed Mrs. Johnson.

“Come here, come around,” gesturing Della around to the front of the chair. As she reached up to hold Della’s chin, a chunky bracelet slid down her forearm, clonking on the armrest. “You have gorgeous blue eyes.”

Della wasn’t used to being examined this way. Her blue eyes darted to the front door to make sure her mother wasn’t coming.

“You should go blonde. And pull it back,” another hand bristling with rings popped out of the drape and together they took the girl’s hair hanging by her cheeks and pulled the locks up to her crown. “See? You’ll have them swooning.”

That evening, as her mother was upstairs making dinner, Della flicked on the transistor radio above the sink. Swaying gently as Johnny Mathis crooned about chances, she opened the cabinet and walked her fingers across the dozens of little bottles lined up by shade. Brunettes, blacks and silvers up top, reds filled the center shelf, blondes on the bottom shelf.

She rolled a bottle of Lady Clairol #005 Platinum Beige Blonde in her left hand and #007 Buttercup Beige Blonde in her right. “The boys are going to notice Didi tomorrow.”