Healing with Tonsorial Surgery
My eye caught the sign in the window: "Open." A little stand-alone building on the east side of College Avenue, just south of the Walla Walla University campus. The south-half of the building . . . an old traditional barber shop.
It was either a haircut or a dog license that I needed, so I made a U-turn as soon as I could, pulled up in front of the shop, got out of the van, and went in.
The barber had his back to me, tweaking some guy's coiffure. No one in the waiting area. In a moment, he looked up.
"Any room for a walk-in?"
He looked so apologetic. "No, I have a 5:30 coming in, what about tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow is fine." I now realized he worked from an appointment register. "When would be a good time?"
"Well, I'm here from 8 until 6, when would you like to come?"
"Oh, gosh, I hope it won't take all day!" I chuckled. "But let's make it first thing. How about 8?" And then I realized, again, I am retired, I don't need to start stuff off at the break of day. "On second thought, let's go with 9."
And so we agreed on 9.
"The last name is James." And he waved his comb and scissors as I turned toward the door.
It has been over 10 years since I have had a haircut in College Place. And I didn't remember that barber from the last time I was there.
This morning, I arrived well before my appointment. He was finishing up his first customer. That customer gave him a tip. The barber explained where exactly that tip was going. Seems he had an account at a local bank to manage the college fund for his grandchildren. It would be going for education.
Somehow, I got the impression that first customer had something to do with education at WWU.
Phone rang. "Bob's Styling Salon. This is Bob." And with a short dialog, an appointment was made for 10:30.
I was then invited into the chair. As I got settled, covered up with the drape, collared with the paper tape, and felt the preliminary assessment of my hair by the resistance to his comb, "My, you've certainly got a head full of hair!"
Well, I knew that. That was why I was there.
I could see a plaque on the wall with his name. His full, formal name. And I could see it was for recognition for his work with a special education program to support educational needs of inmates at the Washington State Penitentiary.
Something was firing a very faint synaptic event deep within a memory.
There was something about the physical appearance of the barber. A small man, probably 10 years my senior, a full head of creamish-blond curly hair. I thought I was back in the 70's.
Our conversation wandered. Where had I gotten my last haircut. In a little town in Texas. How glad and appreciative he was that I returned today, for I could have gone anywhere else. What had brought me to his shop. How it has been nearly 10 years since I was there last. How he used to be up in the Pen, how he has been in College Place since 1960.
And it then clicked!
A flood of memory.
A 16 year old boy. Chosen to be a delegate by the Village Church, to represent the Church's MV (Missionary Volunteer) program at the North Pacific Union Conference Youth Rally held in Portland, OR in the spring of 1962. An adult sponsor of the Church's MV program. A barber. His name was Bob.
I leaned forward in the chair. He stepped back.
"You know?" My mind was trying to fit it all together. "Do you remember sponsoring the MV program for the Village Church for the Walla Walla College Academy students way back in '62?"
He looked at me with a kind of vague, questioning stare. Where was this going.
"I remember, one of our sponsors was a barber, his name was Bob, and I remember a talk he gave to us once. There is only one thing I remember, but I have never forgotten that picture in my mind. Maybe it was you? You, that sponsor, started off his talk with the statement 'My first memory was running, running down a railroad track.'"
He bend around me. Looked at me in awe. "That was me." He paused a moment. "I was running from my father."
Our conversation bounced around incidents of 45 some years ago. The other two College Place barber shops that don't exist now. How I was the photographer for the Academy annual for the 1962-63 year and how I had made arrangements to stage the group picture of the officers of the "Boys Club" in his barbershop. President in the chair, the others gathered around with the razor, lather, comb, clippers. (And the officers of the "Girls Club" were similarly posed in a beauty salon). How he likely was the one who took the picture, since I was one of the officers in the picture and couldn't take it myself. And how he now wants a copy of that picture, and how I can tell from my computer database just which box that old annual is packed in.
And there is another part of that memory.
It was the very first haircut for me in College Place. October, 1961. Bob was not in that shop at that time, but he knew it well.
Fifteen. So young. So immature. So inexperienced. So naive.
So Canadian. So different.
So very different.
Like in what erupting hormones were doing to the orientation of my life's perspective.
And when my turn was called, how I climbed into that big old barber chair. Told the barber just how I wanted the flat-top to be. Anxiously wondered how this new place, this new experience of living in the United States, this new Academy, this new life would all work out.
When I thought he was finished, there was no attempt to undo the paper collar, take off the drape. Instead, I could hear a noise of banging and swishing. And then. Hot. Hot lather brushed onto my neck and around my ears.
Some powerful shot flamed through my back. I knew nothing of adrenalin. And in the next moment, the pressure of the barber's finger wiping away the lather, and the tingle of a straight razor on my neck. The adrenalin exploded. Never in my life had I experienced a sensation like that.
I left that barber shop a 15 year old man.
Shaved. Neck, around the ears, bottom edge of sideburns.
Touched. Touched in a way I had never been touched before.
The whiff of scented talcum. The exhilarating pain of a razor burn.
Forty some years later that sensation is as real now as it was then.
A return to College Place.
The healing therapy of tonsorial surgery.
The healing touch of touch.
But you can't tell just by the feelings.
The Refectory Manager
It was either a haircut or a dog license that I needed, so I made a U-turn as soon as I could, pulled up in front of the shop, got out of the van, and went in.
The barber had his back to me, tweaking some guy's coiffure. No one in the waiting area. In a moment, he looked up.
"Any room for a walk-in?"
He looked so apologetic. "No, I have a 5:30 coming in, what about tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow is fine." I now realized he worked from an appointment register. "When would be a good time?"
"Well, I'm here from 8 until 6, when would you like to come?"
"Oh, gosh, I hope it won't take all day!" I chuckled. "But let's make it first thing. How about 8?" And then I realized, again, I am retired, I don't need to start stuff off at the break of day. "On second thought, let's go with 9."
And so we agreed on 9.
"The last name is James." And he waved his comb and scissors as I turned toward the door.
It has been over 10 years since I have had a haircut in College Place. And I didn't remember that barber from the last time I was there.
This morning, I arrived well before my appointment. He was finishing up his first customer. That customer gave him a tip. The barber explained where exactly that tip was going. Seems he had an account at a local bank to manage the college fund for his grandchildren. It would be going for education.
Somehow, I got the impression that first customer had something to do with education at WWU.
Phone rang. "Bob's Styling Salon. This is Bob." And with a short dialog, an appointment was made for 10:30.
I was then invited into the chair. As I got settled, covered up with the drape, collared with the paper tape, and felt the preliminary assessment of my hair by the resistance to his comb, "My, you've certainly got a head full of hair!"
Well, I knew that. That was why I was there.
I could see a plaque on the wall with his name. His full, formal name. And I could see it was for recognition for his work with a special education program to support educational needs of inmates at the Washington State Penitentiary.
Something was firing a very faint synaptic event deep within a memory.
There was something about the physical appearance of the barber. A small man, probably 10 years my senior, a full head of creamish-blond curly hair. I thought I was back in the 70's.
Our conversation wandered. Where had I gotten my last haircut. In a little town in Texas. How glad and appreciative he was that I returned today, for I could have gone anywhere else. What had brought me to his shop. How it has been nearly 10 years since I was there last. How he used to be up in the Pen, how he has been in College Place since 1960.
And it then clicked!
A flood of memory.
A 16 year old boy. Chosen to be a delegate by the Village Church, to represent the Church's MV (Missionary Volunteer) program at the North Pacific Union Conference Youth Rally held in Portland, OR in the spring of 1962. An adult sponsor of the Church's MV program. A barber. His name was Bob.
I leaned forward in the chair. He stepped back.
"You know?" My mind was trying to fit it all together. "Do you remember sponsoring the MV program for the Village Church for the Walla Walla College Academy students way back in '62?"
He looked at me with a kind of vague, questioning stare. Where was this going.
"I remember, one of our sponsors was a barber, his name was Bob, and I remember a talk he gave to us once. There is only one thing I remember, but I have never forgotten that picture in my mind. Maybe it was you? You, that sponsor, started off his talk with the statement 'My first memory was running, running down a railroad track.'"
He bend around me. Looked at me in awe. "That was me." He paused a moment. "I was running from my father."
Our conversation bounced around incidents of 45 some years ago. The other two College Place barber shops that don't exist now. How I was the photographer for the Academy annual for the 1962-63 year and how I had made arrangements to stage the group picture of the officers of the "Boys Club" in his barbershop. President in the chair, the others gathered around with the razor, lather, comb, clippers. (And the officers of the "Girls Club" were similarly posed in a beauty salon). How he likely was the one who took the picture, since I was one of the officers in the picture and couldn't take it myself. And how he now wants a copy of that picture, and how I can tell from my computer database just which box that old annual is packed in.
And there is another part of that memory.
It was the very first haircut for me in College Place. October, 1961. Bob was not in that shop at that time, but he knew it well.
Fifteen. So young. So immature. So inexperienced. So naive.
So Canadian. So different.
So very different.
Like in what erupting hormones were doing to the orientation of my life's perspective.
And when my turn was called, how I climbed into that big old barber chair. Told the barber just how I wanted the flat-top to be. Anxiously wondered how this new place, this new experience of living in the United States, this new Academy, this new life would all work out.
When I thought he was finished, there was no attempt to undo the paper collar, take off the drape. Instead, I could hear a noise of banging and swishing. And then. Hot. Hot lather brushed onto my neck and around my ears.
Some powerful shot flamed through my back. I knew nothing of adrenalin. And in the next moment, the pressure of the barber's finger wiping away the lather, and the tingle of a straight razor on my neck. The adrenalin exploded. Never in my life had I experienced a sensation like that.
I left that barber shop a 15 year old man.
Shaved. Neck, around the ears, bottom edge of sideburns.
Touched. Touched in a way I had never been touched before.
The whiff of scented talcum. The exhilarating pain of a razor burn.
Forty some years later that sensation is as real now as it was then.
A return to College Place.
The healing therapy of tonsorial surgery.
The healing touch of touch.
But you can't tell just by the feelings.
The Refectory Manager
posted by The Refectory Manager | 11:17 PM
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