t my high school, there was only one way to wear your hair: long, straight, and blond. In the mid-80s, the brave and perky experimented with crimping irons and perms, but by the time I graduated, in 1992, big poofy hair had gone the way of the two Coreys. The look we were going for was sleek, flat--most of all, it was straight.

This sucked for me. I was born with a head of wavy frizz that had all the discipline of a two-year-old Hilton sister. I spent most nights trying to strangle it into submission with a blow dryer, a static-free brush, and several rubber bands. Since those days, I’ve aquired a cabinet full of serums, sprays, and fruity conditioners designed for women with frizzy hair and dispensible income. Two years ago, I bought a $100 flat iron that quite frankly could have changed my teen years. But moving to New York had made me bold: For once, why not go curly?

A few weeks after moving here, a friend told me about Ouidad, a salon specifically for curly-haired girls. The prices were expensive—OK, ridiculous—but if this worked, just imagine the money I’d save in John Friedmann products! Honestly, more than anything, I just wanted to stop fighting nature. I felt as though I’d been in a wrestling match with myself for two decades. It was like a metaphor for my life.

My Ouidad specialist was Vincent, an older gentleman with delicate hands and a tiny dancer’s body. He complimented me for knowing so much about my hair. He complimented me for going curly. He complimented me for agreeing to buy a deep conditioning treatment, which is something I hadn’t realized I’d done until I was on the wrong end of $50. He talked fast, in a soft, almost seductive whisper, and it was hard to keep up with him. As he rattled on, fighting nature started to look awful convenient. Vincent’s prescriptions for my daily routine involved lukewarm washes without shampoo, pinning up my hair for volume, making finger curls at my hairline, crunching curls to remove the hairspray crust, and learning to stretch my hair without pulling it. I practically needed a protractor and a map. By the time Vincent flipped my hair over to diffuse it while I hung upside down—something I could not manage at home without a third arm--my faith was waning. But when I finally looked in the mirror, I must admit: My hair looked pretty damn cute.

“Welcome to your new life,” Vincent said, and as corny as that may be, I got a little chill.

I walked back to the subway searching every storefront window for my reflection. It wasn’t vanity, but curiosity. Did I really look like that? And if so, did I like it? I couldn’t decide which I’d prefer: Not liking my hair meant I’d just blown $200, but liking it meant I’d probably want to keep coming back. I felt hideously self-conscious, as if everyone on the street must realize I got a new haircut and must be evaluating it as they pass. Maybe this is why I’m so reluctant to change. I can’t even decide what I think before I’m preoccupied with what everyone else does.

Anyway, I had to wash my hair eventually. I had a date with a friend, and I wanted to wow her. I did all the things Vincent told me—well, kind of. I probably did them backwards and wrong. All I know is that when I finished, I looked like one of those “Before” pictures in the magazines with the woman who has this fried, blown-out mess. My caption would read: “This woman just got a $200 haircut!”

I felt frustrated. I felt had. I knew this was probably a skill I could learn with practice, like piano playing or ice skating. But I hadn’t really bargained on a new hobby. What I wanted was to be happy with my hair--not my hair super-glued into ringlets. Most of all, I felt silly for thinking some fancy-pants salon would turn my hair into something different than the hair I’d had for the past 30 years.

When I arrived at dinner, my friend immediately commented on my hair. “It looks great. Did you get a haircut?”

Before I left, I washed my hair again and straightened it all out with my flat iron. Man, that was the best $100 I ever spent.