Dear Ashley:

     Thanks so much for making time for me yesterday afternoon.  I know it can never be a pleasant experience to have one more man appear at your door just before quitting time, let alone a man as desperately in need of your services as I was, but you just smiled and invited me right in, inadvertently revealing in that simple act of kindness both your superiority to most women of your ilk and the impossibility of our being blood relatives.  My hat is off to you now and always - however much you might secretly prefer I'd forever left it on.

     I did not come to you lightly.  Other, more experienced males may think nothing of crossing your portal, waiting their turn, paying their money, and then leaving to live their lives with a new spring in their step and twinkle in their eye, but not me.  I have always been shy when it comes to sitting in the swiveling chairs of women I do not know, and I am especially shy when those women have ready access to sharp instruments.  Thank you for your patience and understanding.  Those qualities alone may well have been enough to eventually lure me to your cubicle and sit still as you shared your magic ways, but the promise of a cookie certainly sped things up and was much appreciated besides.  Thanks for every sweet little crumb, and for using your ability to look into my chocolate chip-craving heart of hearts for good and not for evil.

     You know, as near as I can recall, you are only the second strange woman to work such magic on me in the last 20 years, and - may I be frank?  You were the best, by far.  How it hurts me to recall that you were the one who had barely got started before an unintentional self-inflicted cut sent you scurrying to the first aid cabinet.  I almost cried when you returned and told me what had just transpired.  How awful I felt for you!  How ardently did I regret your pain!  How vehemently did I promise not to bounce up and down with joy again if ever you agreed to take me back into your chair!  
     Is any of this ringing a bell?
     No matter.  It's enough that you know I wish you a full and complete recovery, now and always.

     On the bright side, I didn't once mention your eyebrow piercing, did I?  I bet lots of weaker willed males can't resist commenting upon that at tedious length, but not me.  I know how tiring it can be to have people you don't even know constantly pointing to an odd facial feature and asking "What the hell is up with THAT?"  Just for the record, I thought it was cute the way the two purple end balls provided an aesthetically pleasing color/shape/textural contrast with the silver bar which ran between them and through your right brow.  And pondering to myself whether or not either end ever becomes entangled with your boyfriend's hair during rough sex certainly did a lot to take my mind off the extreme heat I was feeling beneath that black vinyl apron with which you had cloaked my upper body almost the moment we had met....
     For that, as well as for not accidentally severing either of my only two ears with your vigorously wielded implements, mucho thankies.

     Thanks, too, for permitting me to stare menacingly at those photos of your boyfriend taped to the mirror as you went about your business.  He looked to be a very fine fellow, and I hope he still does since that accident at the factory singed off his eyelashes.  How awful to know that such a cruel fate can befall one so young, virile, and off the welfare rolls.  How much worse to learn that that accident was followed by another which resulted in a spark landing unbeknownst in a shirt crease and then setting his clothes aflame moments later as he sat unawares in the ironically entitled Break Room.  If you're going to be set aflame at work, make sure you do it on company time, I always say.  
     If only I had had the opportunity to share the wisdom of my years with your boyfriend (you know - the man whose hair regularly becomes entangled with your eye posts) before it was too late....

     Finally, I'd also like to thank you for taking the time to answer my questions even as you continued to try to concentrate on that task for which I was ostensibly paying you.  Guess maybe I really am the only one who has ever heard of men who perform your type of service with fire instead of cold metal, huh?  In truth, it wouldn't surprise me as I seem to hear a lot of things and comments no one else ever has, least of all those responsible for them. 
     As for your own comment that some guys must be able to shave the lather off a balloon with a straight razor without popping it before they can get their license while all you had to do was demonstrate an ability to give a pedicure to a melon, what can I say but "I had no idea!"  And I hope you know that I'm sincere when I also say that you should in no way feel inferior to them just because the closest you may ever legally come to a male customer is a quarter of an inch.  YOU, at least, may turn a man's hair white or any other color you want, and that is not an ability to be scoffed at.  And the fact that YOU were able to do in a mere 15 minutes what it took my first male representative of your trade a full hour to achieve is likewise something you can take pride in.   Granted, that male seems never to have cut himself in the process of servicing me, but as you yourself must have thought at one time or another, the sacrifice of a bit of flesh is a small price to pay to hear the squeals of delight of a man like myself who practices pig calls on the side. 

     Still, in retrospect, that $3 tip I gave you just doesn't seem to have been nearly enough.
     Sorry.
     Feel free to slap me upside the head next time if I don't remember to bid you adieu by slipping at least a fiver into your sweet little darling mitty-poos.

     (You might want to extend only your uninjured mitty-poo if that cut hasn't healed by then.  Just a thought.)