Sophomore Stories Part XVII "5th Floor Barber"

Until my sophomore I had only cut my own hair once, when I was 8 years old and blamed it on my friend, Kevin. It did not meet with overwhelming praise from my parents and I developed a fear of cutting my hair, or anyone else's hair.

Ten years later, and Big John enters my life. Big John was about 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighed a svelt 250 or about twice as much as me. He was aiming to walk onto the KU football team as an offensive lineman. If that didn't work, he said he was going back to being a bouncer, a successful career path I have no doubt.

Big John had a crew cut. Practically shaved on the sides and back and shortly longer on top. The first week of school, I walked into the bathroom to find him using two mirrors and a loud, humming clipper to shear himself. He noticed me and immediately asked me to help him. Um...ok, was my response.

"Just take these clippers and just fade in between the longer hair and the shorter hair, so there's not a distinct line between them," Big John explained.

I responded, "Um, I've never used clippers before, and I don't want to mess it up." Especially on a very large and very strong behemoth man.

"It's easy. You can't mess it up," Big John encouraged.

"Yeah, I don't want to make it look bad," I weasled.

"Dude, it's just hair. It'll grow back," Big John pleaded.

"Ok, I'll give it a shot," I said as I reluctantly took his clippers and plotted my three quickest escape routes.

So I began just barely touching his hair, trying my best to keep a steady hand as I did my best to fade between the very short hair and the practically shaved off hair.

When I finished, he seemed surprisingly pleased. He thanked me and I went on my way.

About a week later, Big John came to my room and knocked on the door.

"Hey, can you help cut my hair again?"

"Um, yeah...I guess so," I replied.

So, we went down to the bathroom where I again took my life into my own hands and helped blur the line between very little hair and practically no hair.

It was this second time that another hallmate, Rich, walked in.

"Dude, could you cut my hair too?" he asked me.

Before I could answer, he took off and returned shortly in an old t-shirt. He sat down next to Big John to wait his turn.

Rich's hair was easy...typical of the time. Long on top and shaved on the sides and back.

Word caught on that there was a barber shop in our hallway bathroom, and a couple of weeks later, five guys showed up, including James, my roommate, for me to cut their hair. This went on semi-regularly the entire fall semester until Big John disappeared. We never heard where he and his military hairdo went.

In the meantime, I was growing my hair out long too and by the end of the school year, it was down past my chin. That summer, I bought a pair of clippers to keep it short on the sides and back...finally, on July 3, I shaved it all off. I got the same reaction from my parents as the first time.