I’m not one for small talk, if you haven’t noticed.

I am what you would call an outgoing introvert. Outgoing introverts enjoy people and travel and events, but when we’re done, we’re done. There comes a point during any trip or gathering where we have to just leave in order to recharge. Sometimes there’s no warning. All of a sudden, you look up and we’re just…gone.

I used to leave my own dinner parties. No lie. Ask anyone who attended. One minute I would be there drinking a glass of wine and laughing at a story, the next minute I was upstairs reading to my little boys in their cushy blue beanbag chair or cuddling with the dog, just to get away from the anecdotes, inquiries and mindless chit chat.

We can only take so much.

I don’t talk much, not even in the classroom. I choose my words carefully and deliberately, and if I don’t have anything to say, my mouth stays closed. That is, unless there’s something delicious to wrap it around.

(I meant like an ice-cream cone, what did you think I meant? Sheesh. Don’t get me started, now).

Which is why it is so surprising to me how much I confessed to my hairdresser yesterday.

My hairdresser knows nothing about me. That is why I chose her, and why I continue to go to her. She is not reading this blog right now. She doesn’t recognize my last name. She lives in the city and cares very little about the shore. She doesn’t know anyone in my family, and always forgets how many kids I have and how old they are. I love reminding her every time she apologizes for forgetting.

So it’s a safe zone for me where there is no judgement, no frame of reference, no opinion, no preferential treatment. She does my hair, I tip her, and that’s it. My affinity for this type of relationship, one in which each party has a level playing field, is probably the same reason I make such close friends when I travel. Because I am able to open up and be myself, without anyone’s preconceived notions of who I am, what I’ve done, or who I’m related to.

I’m at my best when traveling alone. My absolute best.

I confided in Michelle yesterday, things that if I confided them to anyone else, they would no longer be a secret today. It is what it is. But it felt good to get a few things off my chest, knowing it would go no further than her work station. I’m sure it wasn’t even interesting enough for her to gab to her young husband and one-year old daughter over dinner.  

But I appreciate her pretending like it was. There is no better therapy than sitting in your stylist’s chair.