Back to Ray's Barber shop by Anthony

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One more short true story.
Fall of 83 I started my senior year with a shiny shaved head with a glorious tan. When school started I had fully intended to keep up with the shaved head. I liked the look and so did everyone else. It had pretty much become my trademark look and I really enjoyed it. A lot of friends questioned me about it, with obvious curiosity, but none of them ever got anything shorter than a longish crewcut.

I had a lot going on after school started and every Saturday morning I'd plan on going to Ray's for a head shave, but something always got in the way. Eventually a month had passed and I suppose I had a case of the f*** its or something. Anyway, my hair grew. The months flew by and my hair continued to grow.

By the time spring break rolled around, I had a solid four inches of brown hair. Kind of messy looking over the ears and eyes, not a good look. That Saturday morning I had plans to go with my dad to his office downtown. He owned the building and had made I deal with me to paint the bathrooms for some spending money. When we got in the car he told me he wanted to stop at Ray's and get a flattop. Something he'd been wanting to do for as long as I could remember. I could tell he was a big haircut enthusiast, because there were so many times that he would bring up the flattop in conversations. But in 1983 he had pretty long hair, at least by todays standards. We're talking the blow dried look, not a tapered barber cut.

Of course I wasn't going to talk him out of it, because I was more than ready to go back to bald. It had been five years since we'd been to the barber shop together. My dad went first and Ray thought he was joking when he said he wanted to go with a flattop. My dad's college day flattops were not the longish boxy type, they were full blown razor shaved sides, back and landing strip. It was fascinating to watch, totally hairless other than the flattop rim around the front and sides. Looking directly from the back it looked completely bald.

I was next and was tempted to go with a horseshoe flat, but went for a full head shave as usual. It's always fun getting a head shave after regrowing. The first few weeks with a pale white scalp, everyone knows you're a new badly. I spent the rest of the day helping my dad at his office before we headed home. It was a lot of fun seeing the tables turned. He was so obviously nervous about showing up at home practically bald. By this point it was normal for me and no big deal.

My mom didn't like his horseshoe flat at all, but he kept it and got it recut almost every week. I had decided I was going to stay bald for good, so I bought my first can of Edge shave gel and a decent razor with twin blades. I did a lot of experimenting and found that shaving in the shower using just soap or shampoo was a lot easier and got it a lot slicker than using foam. I think that was late March 1983 and I've been a baldy since.

During my college years short cuts came back, even flattops became a little bit of a fad for a few years. Then in the 90's shaved heads started popping up everywhere. It was fun being edgy while it lasted. hehe.

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