n.The physiological cost of going without affectionate contact.
Research on affective touchEstablished psychological concept
The Hairdresser
She goes every three weeks and does not need to.
Margaret is sixty-seven and her hair grows slowly and a sensible interval would be six weeks, possibly seven. She goes every three, and she tips well, and she has been going to the same woman for nine years.
The haircut is not the point and both of them know it and neither has ever said so.
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The point is roughly eleven minutes long and happens at the basin.
Warm water. A hand at the back of her skull, taking the weight. Fingers at the temples and behind the ears, unhurried, professional, entirely without meaning.