The chair and the three hours
A salon in Yeoville, photographed in black and white in 2015. The equipment is unremarkable. The social function is not.
Being made ready takes time, and the time is not wasted. It is the sitting that makes the appointment worth having. In a salon, the person in the chair is not a customer being processed — they are a participant in a conversation that continues across chairs and across weeks.
The space is usually small, mirrors on one wall, and the mirrors do something specific: they let everyone see everyone. There is no private angle in a salon, which is exactly why it functions as a room.
It is also one of the few indoor spaces in the A township. The everyday word for it, used by people who live in one without any particular ceremony.DSAE · entry that is not a home and not a shop in the ordinary sense — it is somewhere to be, unhurried, for a fixed period, with a legitimate reason to be there.
Three hours of the week that belong to the person in the chair. The haircut is almost the least of it.