Solemn salon

MICHAEL L. OWENS / News Virginian
Published: August 16, 2007

The Cutting Edge hair salon has long been more than just a place to manage coiffures.
Set in a multi-story house, its home-like setting offers many customers a respite from life's daily doldrums. Don't need a cut- Come on in anyway and join in on the gossip. Or just find a comfy groove in the couch, thumb through a magazine and breathe in the atmosphere.
Broken hearts have beat here, too. The salon's founder lost two young grandchildren, her only son and a daughter-in-law in a trucking accident in 2004.
Now, it's a house of rebirth and coming full circle.
Four months after owner Kathy Lynn Chesney, 54, died in a car crash, stylists again trim and dye locks in the house's many rooms. It's the business where new owner Bonnie Craig learned the ropes of the trade.
"I'm excited about owning my own business, and I'm excited about doing it in her house," said Craig.
Beginnings

Craig was toiling in a Waynesboro hardware store when she Chesney offered her a job in 1989. Chesney had cared for Craig's tresses since her childhood.
When Chesney made her offer, Craig had a cosmetology degree, but no skill
outside of school. Chesney had a new business, but no employees.
It was an ideal match.
Craig picked up tidbits not available when catering to the little old ladies at cosmetology school. On one of her first male customers, a neck shave turned into a foray past his shoulders and into his back hair.
"'Kathy, where do I stop-' " Craig shrieked.
Initially, The Cutting Edge had jumped from one Waynesboro building to another before finding a permanent home at 1407 West Broad Street.
"It was more than just a beauty salon for me. When you go there, you're just at home," said loyal customer and friend Martha Serrett.
A photograph of Chesney's infectious smile now beams from a living-room shelf over every customer who strolls into the Broad Street business.
Her will offered first dibs on the business to her family, filled with hairstylists, and then to Craig. Relatives had second thoughts about taking over a business. So, they turned to one of Chesney's beloved friends with a purchase offer.
"I got cold chills when they asked me that," Craig said.
Had it gone to someone else, the family was prepared to keep The Cutting Edge name. The new owner would have needed to come up with another catchy name.
Had it gone to someone else, though, it would have been just too much change for friends and loyal customers.
"I just always had a feeling that it would remain The Cutting Edge. It was just a gut feeling," said longtime customer Martha Barker.

Tragedy

Chesney's life seemed to fall apart March 7, 2004, friends recalled. That's when grandchildren Brittany Armstrong, 10; Edward Armstrong IV, 6; only son, Edward D. Armstrong III, 32; and daughter-in-law Melissa R. Armstrong, 26, died in a car wreck.
Along a Tennessee stretch of Interstate 81, the Armstrongs slowed down for a crash ahead of them and out of sight. A tractor-trailer driver behind them failed to stop in time, first plowing into a pickup truck and then shoving the Armstrong's car underneath another tractor-trailer.
The family died instantly.
Truck driver Nasko Nazov, a Macedonian immigrant, was sentenced to four years in prison for using a fake trucker's license and for falsifying his truck logbooks.
He also landed in the middle of a national license-for-bribes investigation that nabbed hundreds of truckers, and government and driving school officials. Nazov served 10 months in jail for his part in that scandal.
By the time of the wreck, Craig had already moved on to work in another beauty salon, but remained best friends with Chesney.
Craig even returned periodically to help with the accounting.
Chesney dealt with her loss through overseas travel, such passions as antiquing and getting her hands dirty in the garden.
Tragedy struck again March 7, when Chesney lost control of her car on an icy I-81 bridge in Pulaski County while en route to a sister's home in Knoxville, Tenn., to celebrate Easter.
Found in the floorboard of her crumpled car was a book about dealing with grief.

New beginnings

It's been nearly 10 years since Joy Stinespring styled hair as a Cutting Edge employee. Aiding her decision to come back is her life role as Chesney's niece.
There's also a chance to keep her aunt's memory alive.
"I had no choice. I'm here just to keep her name going," she said.
At least once since Chesney's death, family and friends alike considered what the business might be like in a stranger's hands.
The notion of someone else running the business that Chesney built just didn't make sense.
"It was a part of her," Chesney's sister Pat Uzcategui said.
But this is how things are supposed to be.
Said Craig: "I don't want people to come in here and be sad. I want them to be glad and know that we've kept The Cutting Edge alive in her memory."

Contact Michael L. Owens at 932-3563 or