Your Body Hair Is Full Of Secrets

When our fashion editor Connie Wang forwarded me a pic of a flier in my Brooklyn neighborhood for a psychic who claims to divine your future by looking at your used wax strips, my first thought was, Typical Brooklyn. This was closely followed by disgust and questions about logistics. Then, I berated myself for trying to rationalize and explain the mysteries of the universe — at least before I'd had a cup of coffee. Once I had been appropriately caffeinated, my now-awake brain knew that this service required further investigation. So I contacted the provided email address and awaited a reply. I received an email that same day with the cryptic message, "The strips told us you would be in touch." K. I replied explaining my interest in doing a Q&A with her (them?), to which the response was, "We trust in the aura of your email and love this idea." Alright then. And so began my correspondence with Kat Thek, a.k.a. The Used Wax Strip Fortune Teller of Clinton Hill. After just one email exchange with her, I was kind of grossed out, skeptical, mystified, enthralled, and finally just accepting. Everyone has their gifts, ya know? Kat told me she first got the idea at, of all places, a screening of Jurassic Park. "I noticed the mosquito’s amber looked like beauty wax — I happened to be waxing at the time," she says. "That gave me an idea — if scientists could bring dinosaurs from the past to the present using amber, then naturally I could bring the future to the present using beauty wax." The process, as described by Thek, involves clients snapping pics of their used wax strips and emailing them to her. So no, you don't have to carry around your used strips or hand them off to a stranger. And sure, your bikini waxer might look at you funny if you ask to keep yours or take pictures. Then again, we know that's definitely not the weirdest shit they've seen. "The first thing I do is find the North Hair," says Thek. "After that, I find the smallest hair and the largest hair. These three points form the Trifollica. Located within the Trifollica is the past, the future, the everything... From the Trifollica, I read the curl angles, strand density, follicular lines, and colorization to reveal the stars of one’s personal constellation." She also notes that, "What remains unwaxed is just as important as what is waxed."

Curiously, I asked her if it makes a difference which area is waxed. "I find that certain locations yield specific results — bikini strips, for example, are rooted in the sacral chakra and contain valuable romantic insights," she says. "Strips from the taint area [yep, she went there] are especially accurate for Tinder/Grindr-related inquiries. Eyebrow strips are connected to the third eye and are useful for anticipating passive-aggressive jabs, specifically at Thanksgiving." Good to know as we move into the holiday season. When queried as to why wax strips, she responds simply: "As below, so above." Makes sense in a vaguely existential way. Thek says she doesn't charge for the first reading, but after that "there is a sliding scale based on your predicted income." Obviously, we had to try this. Well, not me personally — I've been under the hair-removal laser, so I am blissfully exempt from all body-hair-related experiments. Fortunately, Maria Del Russo — our beauty editor/unofficial body-hair correspondent — was game. And by game, I mean I browbeat her into getting a bikini wax for the sake of this article. After her quick trip to Bliss Spa for an impromptu hair-removal session, I sent in Maria's strips for Thek to analyze. Side note: You never really know your coworkers until you've emailed pictures of their ripped-out pubic hair to a total stranger. Team-bonding exercise?

Thek gave us her VIP speedy-turnaround service and delivered a reading in less than 24 hours. Maria's future, according to her bikini line? "Your obtuse curl angles and sharp follicular lines suggest that someone close to you will present you with a perplexing string of emoji. Remember, Dear Waxer, that emoji are hand mirrors we use to explore our most mysterious areas. What is reflected to you in flying money/eggplant/leotard girls may be similar to what your text partner sees, but no two mirrors can share an identical reflection." She adds, "You live in the world you see every day: Take time to curate your visions. Avoid all subway seats this week. Remember: Rainwater is the best-case scenario." Maria's reaction? "If someone ever told me my pubic hair would be able to tell my future, I'd have told them to pour themselves another shot of tequila. But, I have to say, I kind of loved the way she used emoji to talk about looking at things another way, especially when it comes to texting. Although, tbh, 'flying money/eggplant/leotard girls' sounds like a lineup I'd see if someone was confessing to blowing cash on strippers the night before." She continues, "Craziest thing? I actually went to sit down on a subway seat this morning on my way to work, and the guy who was sitting there before me must have sweat through his shirt, because there were some funky-looking drops on the seat back. So I avoided it. HOW DID SHE KNOW?!" Spooky. As for those who doubt or are grossed out by her services, Thek offers these pearls of wisdom: "If you exfoliate, there is no need to fear the future." Definitely a lesson we could all stand to learn. I think.