I've always felt at a bit of a loss in barbers. Never quite at home. To parapharase the eternal Monkees, I thought Barbers were meant for someone else not for me. Although, unlike love, which I can probably do without, I need to get a haircut every now and again.
I have, however managed to find a barbers which is pretty quiet, they cut my hair fine and I'm almost approaching relaxed when I go in there. I even know the barber's name - although it's by other people using it and he doesn't know mine - but still, it's a big step for me.
Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with someone cutting my hair, that's not the issue. Well, let me tell you, I think this pretty much sums up how I feel about barbers.
The last time I went to get my hair cut it was a grey, miserable Wednesday evening, no one else was there, which is the reason I was (there, that is). As usual the barber, Michael, and I were engaged in chit chat, or patter or whatever you have with barbers. I was keeping up my part of the contract; he cuts, I chat. Well I chat a little bit.
We were talking about the state of the world and the like. It had been rough recently. He leaned forward to me and I could see the light reflect of his bald head.
"If you ask me we're heading towards the end times."
"Haha," I said, always an appropriate response to a situation where I'm not sure what's going on.
"No, I'm serious," he says and looks around.
He stops cutting my hair and holds the scissors closed in his hand.
"There's been.. portents."
I look at him in the mirror. He's staring straight into my eyes and I think he's being serious.
"Err, you mean the stuff on the news lately?"
"No, other stuff. Some of the things I've seen in here. You might think I'm crazy but let me tell you about what happened here a couple of months ago.
A man comes in, a big fella, one who hasn't been in before. It was a really grotty night, just like tonight and it was just me in. This bloke's a business type, pin stripe suit, briefcase, the lot and he's chunky - big - mid 30's I'd say. I get a few businessmen in so I didn't think it was unusual.
So I tells him to sit down, like I always do and ask him what he's having.
He says he'll just have a trim, just tidy every thing up and then promptly closes his eyes and falls asleep.
Now you might think that's odd, but you see it often enough as a barber, some old boy comes in, relaxes and plonks out, the snorers are the worst. So I set out, and start trimming away. After about a minute I get to the middle of his head and I can feel something with a different texture. Again, nothing too unusual about that, usually just a mole or something but this felt different. It felt like glass or plastic or something. I assumed that he might have a metal plate in his head or stitching so I pushed his hair aside and there was a tiny seethrough plate, a circle about an inch wide.
The strangest thing was, I couldn't see his bone or brains under it, but a toy train set. A little red train going around and around and around on a little circular track. Had a little light on it and everything. I think it must've taken up at least half of this bloke's skull."
At this point I, obviously, felt very uncomfortable. But I was intrigued.
"So what did you do," I asked the barber.
The barber took his scissors and began cutting my hair again.
"Well, I stared at it for a while and then I carried on trimming his hair. When I was done I woke him up, he got up, paid and left. I've never seen him again"
"Oh," I said. There didn't seem to be anything else I could say. The rest of my haircut was conducted in silence.
I'm thinking about getting a new hairdresser, but , as I said I always feel at loss at the barbers.
