If any woman says that she doesn’t care about what she looks, either she lies or she is a saint.  In a society where too much importance has been attached to outward appearance, we just can’t be more careful about our looks. To keep in shape, we sweat it out in the gym and force ourselves on tasteless diet. We could hardly enjoy a marvelous meal or delicious ice cream without any guilt.  To dress for an important date, we search through pile-up fashion magazines and spend a great fortune on any item to boost our appearance. Every day, we go through complicated skin-care ritual because we hope that those bottoms could magically keep us stay young. The only question is how far we would like to go to look good?

Despite all the talks of personality above appearance, I have to admit that the outside matters. Although it might be not as important as the inside, still it has played an important part in our life.  Shallow or not shallow, I also tried hard to look good.

Spring Festival is coming, and it is the time for some changes. My hair was healthy but it didn’t have any body. Last night I went to a hair salon and had my hair waved. To be honest, I didn’t have any sense of fashion. I had no idea what’s in or what’s out. Therefore I put it entirely on the hand of the professional: my hair stylist. I told him that all I wanted is Natural and Manageable.

Four long, tired, dull hours later, I stared openmouthed at my reflection in a mirror. My dull, mousy hair was a distant memory. This one was curly like a lion’s hair, far from something I could call as natural. And I highly doubted that it could be easily maintained. All it takes might be a slight change of weather and I would get serious frizz problems!  Actually I looked like a baby doll---a baby doll in 30s. So it kinda of awlful and ...scary. I didn’t know if I’d ever have the nerve for something that dramatic.

“Do you like it?" my hair stylist said proudly. For a moment, I really wanted to yell at him. For one thing, yelling in public was not my thing, for another, it was almost 11:00, and he really worked overtime for this. So all I could manage to say was “Thank you."

Perhaps I looked so crestfallen that even my husband didn't jest at my new hair. "It was not that bad,” he said "it gave you a fresh look."  

But I didn’t want to look that different. Oh, gosh, I wish I could turn back the clock.