The quiet barber

I got my hair cut today. I abhor getting my hair cut. It ranks right up with going to the dentist, but at least my dentist offers me good strong drugs. I go to the Glasgow Dental School, which is actually a pretty creepy place. Behind the receptionist you can see one of their classrooms. There’s row upon row of ancient dental chairs, complete with banged up instrument trays and filthy overhead lights. It’s like a bad dream. And not a mannequin to be seen – they practice on live patients. But who would volunteer?

What makes my visits to this horror-film setting so pleasant is the Sedation Suite. This is where they administer the excellent drugs: liquid Valium on a continuous drip. It drowses you out, but you still remain awake. Awake but not giving a shit. When I’m under that Valium spell, they could do anything they want in there and I just wouldn’t care.
The other nice thing about the dental school is all the pretty nurses, assistants, and trainees, all in white and blue uniforms. There’s something about a woman in uniform…

And maybe that’s part of the problem with the hair cutting. Lack of uniforms. It’s also the difficulty I have with telling them what I want. I never know how to describe it. What if I’m wrong? What if my head ends up looking really stupid because I didn’t use the right terms? ‘Medium short’ can be interpreted in so many ways.
My favourite hairdresser – indeed the only hairdresser I even felt comfortable going to – was Cass, back when I lived in Ottawa. We were friends too: we used to drink at the same place. We had an understanding, me and her. Nice and quick, knew what I wanted, and no excessive chatting.

That’s the main problem: the chatting. I don’t enjoy small talk, and it’s impossible to avoid it at the hairdresser’s. Especially with my accent.
“So where are you from?”
Oh shit. Here we go. I try my best unapproachable mumble.
“Canada.”
I’m not excited about it, I’m not leading into anything, and I’m careful that my inflection drops on the final syllable in a bid to discourage anything more.
“Oh, nice! Whereabouts? My Aunt lives in Edmonton.”
There’s always the aunt in Edmonton. In fact, it’s not just hairdressers with Aunts in Edmonton. I’ve met hundreds of Scots who make the same claim. It’s not that I doubt them. It’s not even that I don’t care. It’s just that I don’t like being stuck in that chair subjected to a forced interrogation.

Please, can’t you just cut my hair and leave me alone? But no, just by sitting in that chair I’ve effectively waived my right to privacy.
At some point comes the inevitable “So what brings you to Scotland?” question. Sometimes I feel like just making something up, but even then it would just lead to more questions. Maybe next time I’ll just say: “I’m on the run from the law. I murdered a hairdresser.”

It would be so much easier if I got my hair cut more often. I’d be more fluent in the language of hair; they’d have less hair to cut; maybe I’d even end up finding one that would just cut my hair and not interview me.

To any hairdressers that might be reading this: I mean no offence. You are obviously interested in people and maybe you’re just trying to make your day more interesting. But how do I tell you to stop asking me stuff and just cut my hair, without offending you? I’m nervous and irritable in the barber’s chair. I’m trapped. There’s nowhere to go. I am held captive in a forced one-sided social situation that should have only been a haircut. If I growl you might retaliate: nick my ears, or mess up my hair so badly it takes another year before I return.

And then there’s the mirror. I hate looking into a mirror for that length of time. I hate seeing my awkward attempts to disengage from conversation. This time I made an effort to avoid looking at the mirror at all, hoping that it might also signal my desire for internal reflection and meditation. It didn’t work, of course.

At one barber in Charleston, SC, they sat you in the chair backwards, looking out. I think it was so that the customers could watch the college football on the seven plasma TVs they had there. It felt really strange but it made a heck of a lot more sense. Too bad I’m not a football fan.

I’ve had ear-nicking barbers; I’ve had flaming gay barbers. I’ve had the hairdressers that rub their tits against me at every opportunity, which makes life more interesting but still doesn’t make me any happier being there. I’ve had good barbers and bad barbers. But they’ve all got the curse of the gab.

Please, can you tell me: where is the quiet barber?