I came across this picture of President Obama recently and it made me think. The worst thing about having a shaved head is……. I miss going to the barbershop. The last time I went to a barbershop was probably close to 20 years ago. I started shaving my head right around the time that my wife and I started dating.
The barbershop I used to go to was the old Jerry’s Den on Lenox Avenue in Harlem. It was always packed because everyone was waiting for the one or two barbers that were guaranteed to give you a good cut. Most people would rather wait and hour or two to make sure you got a barber that didn’t give you a jacked up cut.
The main thing I miss about the barbershop is the conversations and camaraderie. I’ve had some of the best arguments/discussions on politics, religion, race, sports, and relationships while waiting to sit in the chair. The conversations were always brutally honest, and at most times politically incorrect. But they were always fun, always comfortable. Much like the movie made famous by Ice Cube and Cedric the Entertainer, the barbershop is one of the few places in the world where black men let their guards down and just “keep it real”.
I need to take my boy to one of the barbershops in the old ‘hood. I can’t imagine not having him experience that at least once in his life. As my friend Des told me recently, “you don’t have to have hair to go to the shop. Just go and sit around and talk ish! That’s really what they are there for anyways, right”?