Once I finished assisting Don Hammontree in installing my air conditioner, I had about an hour to spare before I would need to make my way to Floyd's Barbershop on Mass Avenue (the one between Harvard and Porter Square, not the one on Mass Ave near Symphony Hall in Boston) to get my head shaved.
I generally don't speak about my physical appearance as there is not a great deal to discuss. But I do have an interesting history regarding my hair. When I was a wee lad, I had an afro which made me look like a baby Art Garfunkel. I wish I still had a picture I could show you.
However, by the time I was five, my hair had straightened out and was so long that I sometimes mistaken for a girl. Then by the time adolescence hit my hair was just a plain mess. It took me awhile to understand the importance of grooming and before 9th grade began, I had my hair cut short to better fit in. That worked - for awhile.
During my final year in high school, I grew my hair out. The problem was that I was starting to lose it. I was 18 and was losing my hair. During my university years in Ottawa, I again kept my hair short until the late 1990s when I grew it out again. By this time, my head had thinned out considerably on top. I looked like Kelsey Grammer when he sported longish and occasionally people would call me Frasier. Eventually I began wearing my hair in a ponytail.
I still had the long hair when I arrived in Boston in March 2000 and would keep that way until shortly before the 9/11 attacks. It wasn't until July 2013 that I went to Floyd's Barbershop for the first time to have my head completely shaved. A year earlier, I began sporting my handlebar mustache and it stood out more with a bald head.
I've only regrown my hair (such as it is) twice since having my head shaved. The first time was December 2017 through June 2018. I was going through extended period of unemployment at this time and thought perhaps my bald head was turning off some employers. Then after more than five years of baldness, I started regrowing my hair in December 2023 and I attribute this to both feeling cold inside this sometimes-drafty house and my kidney stone ordeal which virtually dominated my life in November 2023.
My mother says I look better with hair than without. While it does help during the winter months, it is very uncomfortable during the summer months. So off it went with the help of a friendly hairstylist named Cherry. She came up to Cambridge from Texas two years ago because she felt uneasy and unsafe where it concerned the treatment of non-binary people down South. Under the circumstances, I could understand her decision.
As she sheared off what little hair I had, we discussed Gene Wilder, her plans for the Boston Calling Festival and my plans that evening to see Toni Stone at the Huntington Theatre in Boston (more on that in an upcoming dispatch).
I've never had aftershave applied to my head, but it felt very cool and comfortable. I made sure to give Cherry a generous tip as I try to do with most service sector workers that I encounter.
At this point, I don't know if I am going to stay bald as I did after getting my head shaved in 2013 and 2018 or if I will simply grow out my hair in the winter going forward. That is a decision for another day.
In the meantime, there are decisions to be made for today and enjoyment will be the order of the day as my Memorial Day Weekend reverie continues.
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