On a quasi-dare, during my exams in my third year of university, I had all my pubic hair waxed off.
One day my trusty roommate and I rambled into my car in sweatpants and tee-shirts ready to face the open road. We drove out of our sleepy university town to the slightly booming city of Burlington, Ontario. Lauren was from Burlington and assured me that she knew the perfect place to go get our tender-areas waxed.
Driving along on one of the beautiful side streets, a man beside us honked and motioned for us to roll down our windows. "You have a flat!" he yelled quite rudely. Me, flabbergasted and far too worried about getting my pubic hair removed, pulled over outside an Office Depot. For a brief second I though this might be the very incident that saved me from having to get my pubic hair ripped out, but then, I found myself blurting out, "Call a cab, we will deal with it later." As though my brain decided it would be a great trick to play on my vagina.
We took a cab to Julie's Esthetic's, a wonderful little house with brand new carpeting, white walls, and Van Gogh replicas all over the place. It smelled like rubbing alcohol and sweat. "Joy will be right with you," said the middle-aged blond who sat behind a glass partition. Protection no doubt from the millions of people who pulled guns on her and demanded their money back after having their pubic hair ripped out.
In comes Joy, a nice looking woman with short brown hair. My new best friend. I follow her upstairs where there are several rooms, one of which I peak inside and see a machine that looks like it should be mass milking cows. I follow Joy a little closer after that.
We enter yet another white room and Joy asks me if I've ever had waxing done before. I tell her only on my eyebrows. She begins snickering at me, "Wow, you are really jumping the gun sweetie," and tosses me the smallest towel of all time and tells me to get undressed. I lie down and wait for her to return, listening to dolphin sounds from the pink ghetto blaster in the corner, all the time wondering how I thought this was a good idea.
Joy comes in and removes the towel and I start hysterically laughing. She complements me by saying I have a nice hair pattern, I say thank you? She begins by spraying this crazy witch hazel stuff all over, which is cold. I again start laughing. Like how I laugh every time the dentist puts the crazy robotic chair down to check my teeth.
She explains how she will do the larger strips first and then the smaller more "intimate" ones. She goops some wax on the upper portion of my whoo-whoo area and beings asking me a million questions. Right before she is ready to rip the first one she asks, "So are you in school" and I answer as though she has some ulterior motive. She then asks what my program is, but before I can get it out, she rips. I scream, "Holy Fucking Jesus!" and then start laughing again (Only later do I noticed the Jesus fish necklace she's wearing). I feel like a man who's been kicked in the crotch by someone with abnormally pointy boots. I'm in fetal position. She tells me to "relax" and asks me about my exams. She rips again, this time not so bad. She begins telling me how some of her clients have threatened her. I wonder if she's reading my mind, trying to calm me out of it. I have fists of rage, like when you want to throw the coffee table you just stubbed your toe on.
On the final strip, after much awkward positioning and words like "labia" and "lips", Joy asks me, "why are you doing this?" and I again cannot even fathom an answer. She then shrugs and says, "I mean, I just use Nair for bikini...It works much better..." I STARE AT HER, open mouthed that she would even ADMIT this to me NOW! I'm still in shock as she grabs hold of the last strip. Just before she rips it, she looks down at my bewildered face and says, "You don't think I'd honestly do this to MYSELF do you?" and pulls the
last strip off with all her might.
After a bit more tweezing (yes, tweezing) and prodding she leaves and gives me a small bottle of "soothing oil" used to remove the wax left over on my skin. I automatically start application and IT BURNS! I mean, not a slight tingling sensation, it mother-fucking-burns! I start to panic thinking maybe she gave me some rubbing alcohol by mistake or that one of her co-workers thought it would be a fun joke to play "switch the bottles". I start dancing around the room, trying to air it away. I grab the first original nice cool spray and quickly extinguish the fire-crotch that once was my fun-loving easy-going vagina.
I go back downstairs where Lauren begins eagerly searching for an expression on my face. I see Joy (more like fucking PAIN) and comment, "that stuff stings a bit huh?" and she says "Yea it does..." disinterestedly turning back to the woman behind the counter. I feel like screaming, "THANKS FOR TELLING ME, BITCH!" and taking a bite out of her cheek.
I sit and wait for Lauren. She said later she could hear me laughing from downstairs, a sick sounding laugh. I slouch down in my seat, trying to hold the general weight of my body off my vagina. The receptionist tries to small talk with me but I ain't havin' any of it. She's one of them. Several women float in and out of the room, all dolled up, all using words like "gorgeous" and "sweet" and phrases like "you are SOooooohhh good to me." I decide right then and there that this is cheerleader heaven and tomboy hell.
Lauren finishes and we grab another cab out of there, call CAA (no jack in my car) and get the donut on. Driving home I can't go over 80km/hr. otherwise my tire will burst into flames and then my pubic hair ripping will have been for nothing.
Finally we get home, and I stand under the cold shower for a good half hour. For weeks after I'm caught off guard when I see myself naked, like a bald man who's lost his favourite hat. I feel as though I possess an unnatural form of nakedness. I have yet to wax it again since.
