Ann’s Fashion Fortunes

By Ann Rosenquist Fee

DEAR ANN: Is there somewhere in Mankato I can go for professional braiding? DEAR READER: You mean, you’re tired of driving to Minneapolis for expert braid work?!?

So was Ruth Aganya, so last summer she opened a salon in Mankato’s Old Town. Ruth and her team of stylists will braid your natural hair with or without extensions (synthetic or human, for sale at the shop) or give you a spectacular wig or weave or create whatever look you desire, and she means it — Ruth is fearless about duplicating complex patterns and styles upon request.

Her business relies on it, and business is booming. It’s also warmly welcoming. Ruth makes a point of saying that all hair types can be braided and all are welcome at her salon.

Hours vary, but she’s open most evenings after she wraps up her daytime job as a refugee program specialist and COVID care liaison for the Minnesota Council of Churches. I highly recommend strolling by some weeknight after 6 p.m., and if

Ruth Aganya's braiding salon at 127 E. Washington St., Mankato, is open for business most evenings. the salon lights are on, stop in and strike up a conversation and see where it leads you and your hair.

DEAR ANN: I am noticing that it’s trendy to use face serum before primer or moisturizer or anything else, and also that “double cleansing” is a trend, which I am pretty sure is just what it sounds like. My question is, if I do them both, don’t they just cancel each other out? DEAR READER: I mean, I wanted to say yes because when I first learned of these tandem trends they also struck me as a zero-sum game.

But then after I got hooked on a foundation with serious staying power (Dermablend, you guys, it’s a topic for a whole other column in some magazine about zealous loyalty), I found myself washing my face twice at night, mostly in the interest of not staining my lightcolored towels.

It was good for the towels and also really good for my face, which felt squeaky clean, which was satisfying yet I knew from years of reading women’s magazines that this probably meant I’d depleted some critical natural oils.

And I don’t really know what makes a serum different from an oil or a balm, but I can tell you that just the word “serum” sounded like a level of medicinal potency that would restore some natural luster to my newly stripped skin, so I bought some.

Sure enough it felt great to apply it and then when it sunk in or dried or whatever, it made the whole too taut surface feel kind of velvety. I don’t know what damage it does in the long term, to clean so harshly that you need that kind of product to recover, but I can tell you that the results feel so nice to touch that you’ll probably get hooked like I did, and I say go ahead because there are worse addictions in this world. Good luck. DEAR ANN: I hate my hair right now and it is my own fault. It’s too short. The stylist showed me what an inch off would look like, then 2 inches, before she cut. All I had to say was “yes, that’s good,” but that’s not what I said. I said, “Let’s go for 3.” I don’t know why I did that because I regretted it right after I said it and there was time to stop but I did nothing to stop her. Now it’s all I think about, how much I hate this length and how long it’ll take to grow out. Why did this happen and what else am I going to do? DEAR READER: Oh honey. It’s scary the first time our innate desire for spiritual growth ruins a hair appointment. But that’s all that happened. You didn’t “do” anything — the part of yourself that craves enlightenment simply slid into the driver’s seat and turned an otherwise routine salon visit into an occasion for self-awareness and improvement in the classic form of forcing you to make do with undesirable hair.

You’ll want to buckle up for a good long ride, because it sounds like your inner life coach authorized a trim that requires months if not years for full recovery. The sooner you embrace this fact and start living accordingly, the better insurance that you won’t plunge further into aesthetic self-sabotage.

Go buy some product or barrettes or whatever it takes to give you hope and a way forward, and let the journey begin.

Got a question? Submit it at annrosenquistfee.com (click on Ann’s Fashion Fortunes). Ann Rosenquist Fee is executive director of the Arts Center of Saint Peter and host of Live from the Arts Center, a music and interview show Thursdays 1-2 p.m. on KMSU 89.7FM.