The Haircut

To seat oneself in the chair of an unknown barber requires undaunted courage. To mitigate potential desecration of the pate I consulted the phone app Yelp. I scrolled through the list, observing comments and star count, before settling on a highly praised barber shop about 5 miles away.

You can't be too careful.

It was an unassuming place with four barbers, three of whom were men servicing customers and one a woman sitting in her chair waiting for a customer, me, to walk in. For a nano-second I wondered if I wanted a woman cutting my hair. The hesitation is not regarding the results but regarding the process. 

Don't get me wrong. I've received

excellent haircuts from women

barbers.

To illustrate my point ...

I know a barber in New Hampshire who gives me a very fine haircut, one that moves along. He has electric clippers with built-in vacuum and goes buzzing and wooshing over my head, then snips away so fast the scissors blur. He sweeps off the cape, whisks me off, and I'm back on my feet in five minutes. 

Women tend to be more detail oriented. For example, I spent about 45 minutes in the chair today and felt as though the hairs on my head were getting individual attention. Yes, I received a high quality cut. I do appreciate the results. But I'm not used to the slower pace around here generally and this was one more plentiful consumption of time. Maybe it's me.

They advertise Nicoderm here a lot. I wonder if there's also an arm patch I can buy that infuses more patience.