She Lived Like a Superstar💫
- Hairline Illusions
- 11 minutes ago
- 3 min read
We finished this readymade wig, set it down, and did what we always do. We looked at it and asked each other who it reminded us of.
Her name came up. Then the memories started.
She was our client for more than fifteen years. She has gone to her heavenly home. We are keeping her name to ourselves, but her story is too good to keep quiet.
She wore lace systems. She never had sensitive skin, she liked what she knew, and she saw no reason to change it. Her pieces came in on a rotation, so there was almost always one of hers on a block in our studio. Twice she sent three at a time. Every two or three years she added another to the collection.
She named them. All of them.
Dorothy, for Dorothy Dandridge. Lena, for Lena Horne. Diahann, for Diahann Carroll. Each piece reminded her of a woman she admired, so it got the name to match. There was one for the opera and one for dancing. A travel wig. A wig for lounging on the beach. She had a hair system for every occasion on her calendar, and her calendar was full. Attached are the six that stayed in her regular rotation.
She stood four foot eleven and walked her neighborhood every single day. The neighbors knew her by sight. Nails done, lashes done, brows done, always. She told us once that she was seventy-two. She was eighty-two at the time, and she did not look a year over sixty, so she had earned the right to round down.
She had not long retired from New York City transportation when we met her, and she used to tell us, "I can't take the money with me after I'm gone, so I'm going to live like a superstar." She meant it, and she did it.
She was the most patient client we have ever had. Never once late. Always thirty minutes early, sipping the tea we kept ready for her, reading one of her favorite novels, waiting without a word of hurry. Every holiday season, cookies arrived from her.
When the person handling her estate called to tell us she had gone home, it hurt more than we were ready for. Yes, estate. She carried herself well and we knew she did fine, but she talked about her city job the way anybody does, so we filed her under comfortable. She was far past comfortable. She simply stayed at a job she loved among people she loved and never once made anyone feel small.
We converted her side swooped wig into one of our Resting Hair® systems for final presentations. She went as herself, in her own hair, styled the way she wore it. When we hear that one of our clients spent her final day in a piece we made, it sits somewhere between honor and heartache, and we feel it every time.
That is the part worth sitting with. We serve clients on fixed incomes who carry themselves with the very same grace. Class has never had anything to do with money. It is how you treat people, how you show up, and what you choose to do with the time you are given.
She was rich in a way her bank account had nothing to do with.
We will miss her. Her list of names is still in our records, and we cannot read it without smiling. This wig reminded us of her first, and that felt like the right way to remember her.
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