Sharp Metal On My Flesh!

Aug 1, 2010

There’s something archaic, yet satisfying, about the presence of a barber pole. Maybe a welcome glimpse of a past perceived as simpler and even slower, one could say? Barbers and their poles (did you know that barbers in the middle ages were actually surgeons? Practicing “bloodletting” to cure ills. And the modern barbers pole had it’s start during that time) are anachronisms in an age of pretentious, gleaming, massive, high-tech salons where the stylists look better than their clients, (before and/or after services). Even the word, barber, which stems from the Latin “barba” – for beard – is less sexy than the term, “stylist”. So, who goes to barbers nowadays?

On a recent weekday this Guilty Guy found himself walking into one of the dozen or so barber shops sprinkled around main street of San Clemente. (Since we’re close to Camp Pendleton the guys have to keep a crisp/clean look and SC is the closest). Anyway, this particular shop was one that we’d passed by on more than one occasion, but today we decided to take a walk through that front door and immediately back in time. My memory was thrown back to when as a youth, with my brother Keith, we were herded regularly into either a military base barber shop or the local barber in our families home town in North Carolina, to begin the then agonizing process of a haircut (aka “butcher jobs” we thought). While it was a bi-monthly occurrence until we reached 16 yrs old, it wasn’t until this weeks visit to the barber where i fully understood and appreciated the comfort and familiarity one gets in settling in the barbers chair so they can begin their process of refining and defining one’s look.

As a young boy, there is something mystical about a barber shop. A moist hot towel to soften the hair around the ears to be shaved is quite a treat to the short legged boys in the magnificent throne of a barber chair. And then there is the ritualistic sharpening of the straight razor on the leather strap to delight a youngster and make him feel like a full-fledged adult. Then there is a smell and “feel” to a barber shop that can’t be duplicated or fully described in words. Barbicide and masculinity, fishing and hunting magazines, shaving cream, oils for the blades, talk amongst strangers, TV’s in the background, the sound of traffic outside and the fresh air blowing through the windows etc. I walked through the doors of “Downtown Barbershop“, where the barber (of asian decent) has been cutting hair for 35 years. At present he is cutting the hair of a military man and his son as i look on. As luck would have it, he was able to cut my hair without appointment, and from there, the adventured ensued.

With a quick, steady hand the haircut began and to be honest I frequently stole glances out of the corner of my eye to see the process unfold. As getting a haircut from a new barber can be a scary experience because of the impending sense of doom that predicates a bad cut. It’s the feeling that I have felt on more than one occasion as hair doesn’t grow back very fast. But Joseph gives me what I was looking for and then we’re onto the shave. “Get comfortable,” he says in broken english, while applying a smooth gel that softens the hair follicles, massaging it into my face with the tips of his fingers. Then he applies warm shaving cream and places a hot towel on my face to simulate a shave right after a shower. As he begins the shave, Joseph explains his technique.“The trick to giving a good shave is holding the blade at the right angle then recognizing which direction the hair is growing, cause everyone is different,” he says. Well apparently he knew which way my facial hair was growing as with each stroke we edged closer to a clean shaven and “baby butt” finish on this mug. My wife is happy! With the flash back over and hair cut and shave completed, i pay Joseph and walk out thinking to myself. ”You’ve got to do this on a regular basis, maybe every other week“. So i guess early rituals aren’t actually wasted whenever it’s appreciated, regardless of the age.

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