Haircut
Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2022 7:35 pm
Just got a haircut yesterday. LOVE getting a haircut. Two things of note:
1. I normally get a haircut when I start feeling a little shaggy, It then takes a few days to get an appointment with my barber. If life is too busy, maybe I wait a week or two before I can go back in. I hate that shaggy feeling, especially for that long. So I did a grown up thing. Now that my barber has online scheduling, I could easily look back at my last couple appointments. It was 9 and a half weeks between cuts, so I went and scheduled another appointment for 8 weeks. It feels weird and good to know that's taken care of. To know I won't have to feel shaggy. (Note that my wife has done this same thing for YEARS... maybe a couple decades, so it's not like I wasn't familiar with the concept.)
2. I love my barber, because he does great work, but also because he understands that I don't like to talk during a haircut. Every single other person who has cut my hair has felt the need to make small talk throughout. I don't like it. I make small talk as part of my job all day long. It's not hard, but it is a skill to be engaging and actively listening while unraveling why their Outlook randomly claims to be updating and immediately locks the whole computer. It has an emotional cost. So the haircut is MY time, where I just relax and let Kent cut my hair. I find it meditative.
One time, some asshole decided to make conversation with Kent WHILE I was getting my haircut. The nerve! And not just small talk, but political observations typical of Fox News viewers I know. And whatever his own political beliefs, Kent wisely gave very non-committal responses. It was clear to me that Kent was trying to move to a goodbye, but this dude was having none of it. Kept up for the entire length of my time in the chair. THAT was when I realized how much I savored the quiet of haircut time. So this last trip, I made sure to tell Kent how much I enjoy getting a haircut and how much I appreciate that he doesn't mind me not talking most of the time. Ironically, we had a very pleasant (but brief) conversation about it.
1. I normally get a haircut when I start feeling a little shaggy, It then takes a few days to get an appointment with my barber. If life is too busy, maybe I wait a week or two before I can go back in. I hate that shaggy feeling, especially for that long. So I did a grown up thing. Now that my barber has online scheduling, I could easily look back at my last couple appointments. It was 9 and a half weeks between cuts, so I went and scheduled another appointment for 8 weeks. It feels weird and good to know that's taken care of. To know I won't have to feel shaggy. (Note that my wife has done this same thing for YEARS... maybe a couple decades, so it's not like I wasn't familiar with the concept.)
2. I love my barber, because he does great work, but also because he understands that I don't like to talk during a haircut. Every single other person who has cut my hair has felt the need to make small talk throughout. I don't like it. I make small talk as part of my job all day long. It's not hard, but it is a skill to be engaging and actively listening while unraveling why their Outlook randomly claims to be updating and immediately locks the whole computer. It has an emotional cost. So the haircut is MY time, where I just relax and let Kent cut my hair. I find it meditative.
One time, some asshole decided to make conversation with Kent WHILE I was getting my haircut. The nerve! And not just small talk, but political observations typical of Fox News viewers I know. And whatever his own political beliefs, Kent wisely gave very non-committal responses. It was clear to me that Kent was trying to move to a goodbye, but this dude was having none of it. Kept up for the entire length of my time in the chair. THAT was when I realized how much I savored the quiet of haircut time. So this last trip, I made sure to tell Kent how much I enjoy getting a haircut and how much I appreciate that he doesn't mind me not talking most of the time. Ironically, we had a very pleasant (but brief) conversation about it.