Saturdays, Haircuts, and other Various Acts of God (Day 70)

Dad, this ones for you, you'll know why.

So yesterday I had my first haircut in a foreign country.

So, I've always been one to treat haircuts as an act of faith. You sit in your chair, you wait, you sit in another (higher) chair, you mumble something about "a little off the top" or "nothing too outlandish" in a way that always implies you have addressed "The Barber" as "sir", even though you didn't mean to. Then if you are like me you take off you glasses and you wait to see what happens.

There is no way to know whats going to come out at the end of the process, for the glasses wearing population most shapes have long since turned into indiscernible blobs by now, and even if I could see what was going on, I wouldn't mention to the man with a razor uneasily close to my neck that I didn't approve of what he was doing. Instead you wait.

One of the wiser Barbers I've ever had (and in my imagination Barbers are always sagely) told me what you ought to do is not to fret but instead just leave everything to the professional. Simply hop up on the Big Chair, look the shear wielding man directly in the eye, and say I want you to do the best job you can, I'm trusting you completely. That he said, should leave the Barber sweating enough to make sure he does the job right. Ever since that, I've to do just that. To take a leap of faith everytime I step into the chair.

The real trick here is to say something totally ambigious to describe what you want. Something along the lines of, "I want it short but not too short" and then knowingly nod at the man as though of course both of you know what too short is and that for a professionsal there is no need for further questions. If you pull this off correctly you should be rewarded with the confusing sensation of both being totally in command of the situation and having no idea what is going on. Drink that it, its the tonic that feuled eight years of the Bush administration.

The problem of course is that when you go in for your tri-annual shearing in Austria you don't have any of the familiar tools at your disposal. Instead you have several badly rehearsed phrases of German that you looked up in a phrasebook a couple of moments before that you can mumble awkwardly as you prostrate yourself before "Der Friseur." In my defense I think I managed to say something about "nothing fancy." Ones trust must therefore become more complete.

In the end I don't think it turned out half bad (although my scalp does look like its of the sort that would like to reelect Ike for a second term). Sadly, my guestmother seemed to think it was a shame to have gone at all.

Regardless, theres a lot to be learned from the Barbershop.