I knew I was in deep trouble the moment I saw the straight razor in the nervous hands of that student barber. It wasn’t the razor that made me feel like jumping out of that chair, but the moment she closed her eyes and took a deep breath I knew she was praying. I squeezed the edges of the arm rest as she began to hack away chunks of my hair. All I could do was look down at the tips of my shoes peeking out from under the barbers cape staring at me in horror. This process was repeated multiple times as she would grab a hand full of my hair and then chop at it with the razor. After each cut I would look back down at the hair falling on my shoes and blame them for this whole mess.
I had asked my mom if I could get some brand name shoes when we went back to school shopping. Something with a colorful swoosh or some sporty stripes. She saw the prices and said no. The beginning of a new school year was getting closer and all of my friends were bragging about their new shoes. We were heading into the 6th grade and I was told that things like this mattered!
I swore that I would never ask for anything again if I could get the high tops with the velcro strap at the ankle. She showed me a similar pair from payless shoes and I went into panic mode. The majority of my shoes came from that place. To this day the smell of that store brings me back to this exact moment where I confessed to my mom that I wanted the kind that had the British flag logo on them. The look she gave me was on another level. In the end the answer was no. If I wanted those shoes I would have to ask my dad.
My parents split up before I made my big debut into this world, so whenever I wanted something that my mother couldn’t afford I had to ask him. I would wait until his weekend came around only to hear him tell me stories of how he would earn his own money as a kid when he really wanted something. I would ask everyone in my family to help me out, but all they ever gave me were stories. If I had a dollar for every story they told me I wouldn’t be sitting in this chair having my hair chopped off.
Haircuts were a routine thing, but what my mom did not know was that sometimes I would go to a different barber shop that charged less and then pocket the rest of the money. Our regular barber charged 8 dollars for a haircut. I would give him a 1 dollar tip and select a new palm comb from the cardboard display. These were also a dollar. You couldn’t leave a real barber shop without purchasing a new comb. I would then get my next haircut at this crusty old barber shop next to Pat Holden’s Liquor store on A St. I forget the barbers name but he was old school. He knew how to give 3 haircuts and you better not ask him for something that wasn’t on his menu. Flat tops, crew cuts and a business man. The business man was a basic clean up, so If you came in with what started off as a razor sharp cut he could groom it back to where it was. He would chain smoke menthol cigarettes while cutting your hair and if you looked old enough he would offer you one. He charged 4 dollars, so if you handed him a 5 dollar bill he would tip himself the change. He did not sell pocket combs, but if you were careful with your old comb you could make it last a couple of haircuts. I always had to wait a while before going home because I would reek of cigarette smoke and Clubman Pinaud talc which he would gently sprinkle onto the soft bristles of his antique barber brush and then commence to beat the life out of you with it. “Now you look like a man” that was the cue to get out of his chair and to hit the road.
So if you do the math, going to that place meant you had 5 dollars to spend. This was a small fortune for an 11 year old kid. This meant that the money was usually spent on junk food at the Woolworth’s snack bar. The first round of Slush Puppies and Frito boats was always on me when I was rolling in dough. The next stop was usually the news stand for some comic books and an issue of Lowrider Magazine and if I had any change left over I would feed it to the nearest video game. What goes up, must come down though right.
I had seen the banner for free haircuts at the Oxnard Beauty College a million times. I lived two streets over from that place, three streets over from our family barber shop and four streets over from that crusty old place next to the liquor store. My heart raced as I walked in and was immediately hit by a cloud of chemicals. That was the first sign I ignored telling me to leave. Someone walked over and asked if I needed help. I couldn’t breathe or talk so I pointed to the free haircut sign. She looked around and pointed to an empty chair. My legs did not want to take me to that chair and when I finally did sit down my gut told me that I was making a big mistake. Just wait until I get those new shoes! You will thank me on the first day of school when I am walking around with a fresh pair and not these old Buster Browns. Just wait! What happened next was a mess. People holding clipboards came over to examine the work and then I could hear the sounds of pens scribbling something onto paper. They were probably writing HAHAHAHA. Kid vs. Lawnmower, kid loses. When it was all said and done I was asked if I would like to purchase some hair products. I did not answer. I don’t think they sold miracles in a bottle at that place. Oh, and they didn’t even sell palm brushes. I should have looked for them before I even sat down.
For being someone that always told me to stop making weird faces, my mom sure did make a lot of weird faces. At least I was always the cause of a weird look or two. So you can imagine the look she gave me as I tried sneaking into the house. The plan was to run into the bathroom and shave my head with the clippers we had, but that plan was foiled by my mom who was in the bathroom hallway putting away a fresh, fluffy pile of bath towels. It was bad, I mean neighbors can hear every word bad. My mom could not believe that our family barber did this. She pointed to our car and said we were going right back, right now. I had to tell her the truth. It came out something like this. Not John, beauty college…for free. She knew I was trying to hustle up the money for those shoes. She threatened to send me to school barefoot to teach me a lesson. She would do it too and nobody would say a word after hearing what I had done.
We hit that parking lot like we were going to rob the place. My mom was halfway to the building when she realized that I was still in the car. I was just staring at her and regretting every move I had made that day. The haircut they gave me sure was a beauty though and now my mom wanted to meet the artist that gave it to me. I could read her lips telling me to get out of the car and get over there now. We walked in and my mom asked the lady at the front counter if she knew who butchered my hair. Nobody knew, or at least nobody wanted to own up to it. An older man come out from his work station and inspected the handy work sitting on top of my head. He said he could try to even it out but if he couldn’t he would just buzz it down to a crew cut. In the most defeated voice you can imagine, I managed to say ok. Every now and then he would break the silence by saying “oh man” or “wow”. Thankfully he could read my mind and got me out of that chair quickly. He probably just wanted my mom out too because she was standing right over both of us. We exited the parking lot like we had just robbed the place and made it home in about 10 seconds. I was so happy that we lived that close. I did not want to spend another second in the car with my mom. That silence was brutal. We did not talk for a couple of days and I did not get the shoes I wanted. Luckily my hair grew back before school started and I never even looked in the direction of another barbershop after this incident. That free haircut cost me a lot that day. I lost the desire for expensive shoes and cheap haircuts all in one day.