Red Shell

I never thought I would become part of this “salon racism trend,” that’s going around social media…nor did I ever WANT to ever become a part of this trend. Yesterday, my daughter and I attempted to go get our nails done. We walked into the nail salon, someone was being helped at the counter to be checked out, & someone was sitting on a chair by the door, or were just waiting on someone else to finish getting their nails done, (as though they’d already been assisted, but hadn’t had their service completed yet). My daughter simply asked how long the wait was for 2 full-sets and one pedicure…she was told it would be 15 minutes. We did this BEFORE we sat down. The woman in the chair IMMEDIATELY said, “I know you see me sitting here…how you gonna just walk in & jump right in front of me?” To which I responded, “you’ll be alright.” She then shot straight up, began to cause a scene, she stomped to the back of the salon…the whole time she was going on about how she wasn’t going to stay and wait to have her nails done. She was being rude and disrespectful, but I wasn’t even fully aware of what was occurring. You see…when a normal person goes to a salon & would like to receive services…you go up to the counter to see how long the wait is (like my daughter and I did when we entered). You don’t walk in & sit in one of the chairs, expecting for people to drop what they are doing to attend to your every need. If there is a line, you get up off your ass, & get in the line…otherwise it just appears that you are not a paying customer…waiting for a paid service, yourself, it appears that you are just sitting there, waiting on someone else to finish getting the mani-pedi that they have paid for. Then again, a “normal person” wouldn’t have completely lost their mind simply because we asked how long the wait was, before we sat down…because we asked in the way a normal person does. A normal person would have calmly stated, “Excuse me, but I have been waiting.” It was clear that she was there prior to us entering the salon, so it wouldn’t have been a problem at all. However, this individual chose to act like a wildebeest. She took off…straight to the back of the salon, in order to get her friend…whose nails weren’t even completely done, because she was now refusing to get her nails done here. All because we walked in and asked how long the wait was. That was it. I’ve seen stories of people being racist like this on social media, but I have never actually encountered this in real life, & I never expected to receive this type of treatment in real life…especially in small-town, USA…yet, here we are. A grown-ass black woman, stomping out of a nail salon, while exclaiming that we “make her ass itch,” (eww, girl) and then accused us of other things (in the presence of my infant grandson, no less). To which my daughter did respond, “nope, I wasn’t,” because after everything that she just did…after the huge scene that she just caused…why should we be expected to say absolutely nothing? This racist display left my daughter so upset that she didn’t even want to get her nails done. This is not the country that I grew up in any longer. 😢😢