Christina Lavil slowly closed her eyes as Brenda Karr started combing her hair.
She tried to recall the last time someone touched her hair so gently.
“I was a little embarrassed,” she confessed.
Lavil told the stylist about the public’s perception of those who live in homeless shelters. Lavil has been living at an Everett shelter for three months.
“We all have our bad times and it’s OK,” Karr, 44, replied. “You’re beautiful.”
A friend of Lavil from the shelter walked by and looked at her hair.
“Do I know you?” she asked.
They laughed, as if they were two high school girls talking in a salon.
That’s exactly the atmosphere Karr wanted to create for Lavil and other women who were pampered Monday at the event for women living in shelters.
“I want them to feel good about themselves, and let them know they can have, and they deserve, a better life,” Karr said.
Known as the “Head of Hair,” Karr volunteers as the hair department coordinator for the event “Queen – It’s A New Day,” which helps women who live in shelters boost their self-esteem by giving them beauty makeovers.
The queen-for-a-day make-overs are part of a community services program offered by the Life Changes Ministry of Everett. The event includes a limousine ride, new clothes, lunch and a crowning ceremony.
“It changes people’s lives because it gives them hope,” said the Everett hairdresser, as her scissors moved from Lavil’s bangs to the back of her head.
“I used to think that cutting hair just makes someone beautiful from the outside, but my life experience made me realize that it helps people change internally,” Karr said.
She could just as easily be among the women in a homeless shelters if not for her faith and strong support from her loving family, Karr said.
Being raised in a Roman Catholic family in Seattle, Karr has a fond memory of playing cops and robbers around the neighborhood when she was young.
She wanted to study at a beauty school after graduating from a high school. The dream was shaken when she became pregnant at age 18.
“I didn’t know what to do and I started crying,” Karr said, recalling a night when her three-month-old baby had a high fever. The child’s father swore at her and went out drinking. “I felt unloved.”
She learned to be strong for her children. She prayed for that strength.
“People have a misconception about homeless women or single mothers,” said Karr, who is now married to Randy Karr, a Boeing project manager who volunteers to escort the queens at the event.
“But making a decision to change is not that easy. If you don’t have the knowledge of what to do or where to go, it’s hard,” she said.
It took Karr 10 years to get her life back on track and to pursue a career as a hairdresser at Gene Juarez. The more customers she meets, the more she realizes that people don’t just come to her for a hair cut. Many of them just need a stranger to listen to their stories.
“A haircut only lasts about four to six weeks, but for them, being able to talk about their problems and to feel relaxed… that feeling lasts forever,” she said. “It’s amazing to see how just being kind to somebody can change their heart, as much as being mean to them.”
She knows how it feels to be desperate. She went through her own struggles, and that’s why she decided to volunteer for “Queen – It’s a New Day.”
Lavil’s haircut was over, and it was time to look in the mirror.
Lavil flicked her new, slightly curled hair.
“I feel so good,” she said, looking into Karr’s eyes. “I never had anything like this before.”
“When you have a thankful heart, you feel different,” Karr said. “I feel so good, too.”
Reporter Tieh-Pai Chen: 425-339-3432 or pchen@heraldnet.com.
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