among men

went to see jerry today. jerry is my barber and his shop is just up the road from here in the next town. i always enjoy going to see jerry, probably as much as i used to hate going to the barber as a kid. then i remember it being torture. older guys with sourpuss' snapping at me, telling me to "keep your head up" or "put your head down". i was a sensitive kid, and some of these guys would put the tissue and sheet around my neck so tight i thought i would choke. they'd grab my chin and move my head like it was on a swivel and sometimes it felt like the clippers were digging into the back of my neck.
as i got older i wanted to stay as far away from these guys as possible. i wanted to grow my hair out like the beatles, and later i only wanted to see a stylist, a real professional who knew what she was doing. and then about twelve years ago, right before my son was born i realized i just couldn't justify it in the budget anymore. i consulted with the lady who then cut my hair and she said "well then, you'd better find yourself a good barber". those words have echoed over the years as i have walked out of less than stellar shops feeling like another side of beef on the line in a chicago stockyard.
but when i did find a good barber, i stayed put. the best guys i have known are usually in little hole in the wall shops with a portable tv playing old cowboy movies on a saturday and piles of crappola everywhere. the first guy i remember like this was in san leandro. the shop was called "tony's" and i made the mistake of thinking the guy who ran it was tony. "no, i'm frank" he said. i bought the place from tony. frank was good, but after a year or two he passed away and the shop sat vacant. i found another guy in town almost as good as frank named kenny. kenny liked the old time country music and swore to make a sailor blush. he also had a stack of playboy magazines on the table between the chairs. after another year kenny dropped dead too. i was beginning to feel like maybe it was me.
the next placed i tried was tony and ed's on mission boulevard in hayward. one of my best friend's had been going there since he was a kid. tony and ed were top notch and over the years they had picked up a banter, like a stand up team who knew each other's rhythms and pauses, so that when you left their place you felt like you had gotten a show as well as a haircut. but tony and ed were at the end of their run too, as tony had been promising his wife for years that he'd finally close up the shop, retire and move her to hawaii. my next stop was al's place in the castro village. and here we stayed for the remainder of our time in the bay area. three chairs on weekdays and a fourth on the weekend it also became the first place my boys would remember getting their hair cut.
and now it's jerry. and as i have reflected over the continued journey, even driving over 20 miles to see jerry when he opened up a second shop up the highway, i ask myself what is it that really matters about finding a good barber? because it's more than just the cut, although jerry does a top notch job. i think it's the company. it's one of the last stops left for a man, often the younger man who goes in once a month, makes the small talk and feels that for a brief time this is also his place. an hour or so to leave family obligation and be among men. and as i see the light beginning to fade in jerry's eyes i also have to wonder when i will become the old guy and there aren't any good old barbers around anymore.