A Hamilton kid goes to the hair stylist

It was a good lesson, but in the end I miss Joe the Barber

There’s this little thing that sticks up at the back of my head most mornings.

About a dozen hairs gang up during the night, sticking up like a bunch of tiny stray paintbrush bristles. I can hear them saying something like, “Let’s not lie down in the morning! Everybody got it? Right!”

The rebellion isn’t a bad thing though: it usually tells me it’s time for a haircut. This is not a big deal. I mean when I’m at home, it’s a 10-minute walk up to see Joe, who’s like a kid in his nineties, though still the best barber in the town. To be fair, with me having only a hundred hairs left, he doesn’t have a lot to do. Mostly we talk – him in Italian, me in English. We get along just fine.

Not so long ago, though, we (I mean me and the Gang of Twelve) had a problem.

I’m on a business trip; Joe is hundreds of miles away. I’m in a city without barbers, at least none I can find. I go for a walk around the hotel. No barbers. I take a ride downtown on the fancy Metro. No barbers. Finally, I ask the friendly-behind-the counter person who calls me Mr. David, for help. “Oh,” she says, “We have no barbers here. None at all. “But sir,” she leans closer; this could be a secret. “We do have a stylist in the salon.”

Hold on, I think. I’m a Hamilton kid. I’ve never been to a hair salon or a stylist, for Pete’s sake. But the gang is growing bolder every day, millimetre by millimetre. “Yoo hoo!” they say, “It’s time.”

So I go down a hallway, around a corner, with a tile floor so shiny I can see myself in it; somebody got up early just to polish it. The smell changes to a perfumey sort of floral. I turn another corner and I’m in the Spa. I know this because a) it’s all pink sofas and new-agey kind of music and b) there’s a sign that reads Spa. The Australian woman behind the counter says, ‘Spa’ with the ‘a’ in apple. It’s the Spaaaa.

I’m in trouble.

The barber is an Egyptian kid about the age of, well, a kid. He invites me into his salon; the chair looks like a business class seat. He proceeds to cut every. Single. Hair. By. Itself. Snip, snip. Then he massages my scalp with this lotioney, perfumey stuff. Then he says in his Egypt-lish, “Want hair wash?” “No thanks” must mean “yes please” in Egypt because next thing I know, I’m laying flat out, having my hair washed. I’m missing Joe really badly. The chair, all by itself, without so much as a “please,” is massaging my back. It’s not over. He says, “Want wax on ears?” I think I’m numb by now. I can only say, “yes please,” hoping it means “no thanks” in Egypt. “Yes please” also means “yes please” apparently; next thing I know, my ears are plastered with pink wax. Yes, pink. It’s so hot I have memories of the blast furnaces in Hamilton glowing in the dark. I’m sure I glow in the dark. This is hot wax. I look like Dumbo in the mirror. Then, suddenly, mumbling something like “this won’t hurt” (how many times did I say that to patients?) he pulls the wax off, a kind of let’s-get-this-Band-Aid-off movement. “Rrrrip!!!” it goes.

My ears have never felt so good and so bad at the same time. I can hear them saying, “What the heck was that?” I have no answer.

I’m done, finally, staggering back to the Aussie receptionist-money taker. We talk about wallabies or something Australian until the bill comes. The bad news is it’s like a hundred bucks (each snip was a buck, I think.) There is good news, though: I am a happy man – my scalp has never been happier. My hair has never been more evenly snipped. It’s happy. My ears are happy, though they look like a baby’s bum and do, I have to admit, kind of tingle. Tingle in a good way, though.

There’s just another teensy bit of bad news. Next morning, I wake up. My scalp still kind of tingly, I think it might even glow. I look in the mirror.

They’re back. The little band of bristle brothers? They’re sticking up. Happy, but you know, still sticking up. I think I can hear them saying something: “Nyah, Nyah!” or maybe it’s “Spaaa!”

Whatever, I’m from Hamilton; the brothers and I aren’t going there anytime soon.

Dave is a husband, father, grandfather, a retired family doctor and medical educator. Look for his first novel this spring - “The Potter’s Tale: a history of the end of the world. Or not.” You can follow him @drathor24 or write him at drdavedavis@gmail.com