Hostage Haircut

Dry January, a month-long feat to be sober, officially launched as a campaign in 2013 under the organization Alcohol Change UK. Guess I was way ahead of my time as “Dry Jan” started for me forty-two years earlier in 1981.

See I grew up in Cincinnati, and my best friend was a fast-talking, wise-cracking, athletic kid named Larry “Pizza Face” Fox, given the moniker “Pizza Face” for his insane love of pizza and his youthful face spotted with countless red tinted freckles. We graduated from Walnut Hills High School in June of 1978 and that autumn, Pizza Face enrolled at the University of Michigan, and I got a last minute baseball scholarship to Northwestern. As BFFs, we stayed in touch, visited each other’s college, and got the band back together whenever we returned home to Cincy for the holidays.

It was on Christmas break in 1980 when “Pizza Face” and I hooked up back home during a wild New Years Eve bash at The Blind Lemon, one of our favorite local watering holes in quaint Mount Adams overlooking the Ohio River. After slamming back numerous shots and with a belly full of liquid courage, we challenged each other to a bet to save our young, liquored-up livers.

The bet – no booze during the month of January, especially our drink of choice, Tanqueray and tonic, or as we called it T&T, a play on the explosive TNT that described how we felt after putting down a bottle or two during a night of indulgence. With “Dry Jan” some thirty-two years in the future, we called ours “No Gin Jan.” And the payment for losing the bet was not banal and boring as money, it was as bet with balls, guts, skin in the game, literally, as the loser had to shave his head. We shook hands and slammed back what we hoped would be our last round of T&Ts until Groundhog Day. And while it was a cool idea, deep down I thought there was a better chance of Hell freezing over than me not drinking for a day, let alone an entire month, as that’s how us twenty-year college kids rolled back in the day with garbage cans full of grain alcohol punch flowing at frat parties on a nightly basis.

But miracles of miracles, back at school, I’d unbelievably made it nineteen days without a drink and amazingly, so had Pizza Face as we checked in and reported out once a week. Then on the morning of Tuesday January 20^th, I’d gotten the results back from a Macroeconomics course for my major and scored a six out of fifty, the lowest score by any classmate per the grading curve Professor Levine posted on a large screen behind him in the auditorium. I trudged over to the Registrar’s office in the twenty below teeth-chattering cold Chicago Windy City winter and did what any weak-assed student would do - I dropped the class and picked a new major, Communications.

Back in my dorm room, as I sulked, shook my head in disgust, I looked down towards the corner of my bed, where poking its glass head out from under was a dusty bottle of Tanqueray. I leaned down, pulled the rocket fuel containing iconic green bottle out and saw what amounted to about a shot or two left in the bottom. I unscrewed the cap, eyeballed the booze, and absorbed a welcoming whiff of the gentle juniper berry. I carefully carried the bottle to the fridge, grabbed a bottle of unopened tonic, and mixed up a T&T. I paused, contemplated, envisioned the endless razzing I’d receive for losing the bet with Pizza Face. I wanted to hold out, I wanted to make it through “Dry Gin Jan,” but that six out of fifty Econ score tipped the scales and I joyously savored perhaps the best T&T ever.

Now I could’ve lied and simply told Pizza Face I was still sober, but my parents taught me one of the only things you’ve got in life is your word, and once you give that up, you’ve got nothing. So, I took my last swig of the tantalizing T&T, walked to my dorm room window, and surveyed the bleak, frigid, gray, Evanston landscape. I grabbed my parka, the old school traditional ones with the faux fur-liked hood and shuffled through two feet of snow over to the Noyes Street Barbershop.

The shop was near the Noyes Street El Station, the “El” the name given for the elevated commuter train system crisscrossing Chicago and its suburbs. I regularly got off at this stop after returning from bar hopping and partying with my buds in Chicago, so I’d walked by the barber shop tons of times, but had never gone in. And this barbershop, at least from the outside, had all the trimmings of the classic old school tonsorium – large glass windows, big block letter font advertising haircuts, shaves, scalp massages. And right outside the entrance, that emblematic, iconic, red, white, and blue barber pole spiraled in a hypnotic, take you back to the Fifties spin.

I strolled by, glanced inside nonchalantly, then passed. I marched back and forth a dozen damn times until the barber, a grizzly bear of a man, six foot five, three hundred pounds, exited the shop. His squared-jawed kisser had stubble as rough as steel wool and atop his massive head was a perfectly quaffed crew cut that was so flat, so tight, a fighter jet could have landed on it.

“Caan I help ya der, son?” the big man bellowed in his thick Chicaaga accent that would become legendary ten years later in a Saturday Night Live skit known as “Bill Swerski's Superfans” where a group of die-hard football fans got together every week at Mike Ditka’s Sports Bar to taak about “Da Bearsss.”

“Uh, uh, I’d like to get a haircut,” I stammered.

“Well, ya must be a smairtie paants gettin’ inta Nortwestern so I assume ya knows ya gatta come in and sit in my chair firr dat ta haippen as waakin’ baack an fort outside makin’ a paath in da snow ain’t gaanna cut it…no pun intended, der.”

He smiled, I smiled, I belched up the sweet tasting Tanqueray, and in we went.

Inside, the freezing arctic Chicago winter melted away to a warm, basking, glow. And if the outside had that classic barbershop look, the interior slammed it home. Two aged leather barber chairs, one blue, one red, beautiful oak cabinets, posters of Marilyn Monroe and Jane Mansfield, infinite amounts of tonsorial products lined the back shelves, an antique Miller High Life clock above the door, weathered manly magazines like Field & Stream, Hot Rod and Sports Illustrated strewn about coffee tables, a small seventeen inch black and white TV mounted in the corner, numerous American flags, and majestic military memorabilia covered any remaining blank spots on the worn brink walls. Hell, this shop was more patriotic than the damn Pentagon.

I was snapped back to reality when the Bunyanesque barber said, “Name’s Aarchibald, friends call me Aarchie. Whom da I haave da pleasure of servin’ taday?”

“Nice to meet you, Archie. I’m Doug.”

So, uh, whuh kainda cut ya want der Douggers?”

Well, here it was, the moment of truth, the eleventh hour, the point of no return, my Dunkirk. I cleared my Tanqueray tasting throat, looked up at the huge, hunk of a haircutter and said, “I’d like to shave my head.”

I couldn’t believe I actually said the words, “I’d like to shave my head.” I wasn’t sure if I’d said it, dreamed it, imagined it, but damn if I didn’t say it.

Well, the big boxcar barber smiled that Grinch like smile, a mile wide across his hefty head, proudly strutted over, leaned in, and said, “Okay der, what’s da bet, kiddo?”

How did he know? How did this mind reader, this soothsayer, this Sasquatch-sized shaman, know?

I froze. I don’t know why, but I froze. Maybe it was the way he knew, the way he’d seen this movie before, the way he made me feel knowing the only way someone would do something as crazy as shave their head was to have a bet on it.

“So, we gatt ya past step one ta get inside as opposed ta walkin’ baack an fort outside. Next step is tellin’ me da bet so I haave a story later fir da gang,” Archie continued.

I was caught, torn between telling him about the bet or running out the door into the freezing cold, when somehow, someway and to this day I have no reason why I did and said what I did, but I looked up at the seventeen inch black and white TV mounted in the corner, and there on the screen, was a huge military plane on an airfield with about fifty American hostages returning after 444 days of captivity.

See back on November 4, 1979, sixty-six Americans were taken captive when Iranian militants seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Of the sixty-six who were taken hostage, thirteen were released a few weeks later; one was released the following summer, and the remaining fifty-two were finally returning home at this very moment. I stared for a few more seconds, watching the unbelievable spectacle, turned to the behemoth of a barber, and said, “No bet sir. Here to show my support for the hostages coming home, how proud I am to be an American today, and to show that pride, I’d like you to shave my good ol’ U.S. of A. head.”

The wide-eyed, gleaming, happy as a clam at high tide look on the colossal coiffures’ face was a look I can still see in my mind to this day. This proud papa bear of a barber stood up straight, massive chest puffed out, raised his hand and then…he saluted me. Hell, I hadn’t been saluted since getting my final honor badge way back in boy scouts.

The beaming barber then offered up, “Son, Aa’m ex-marine, served in Naam, 3^rd Battalion, 3^rd Marines unit. My paapps faaght in WWII, my graindpaap in WWI, and what ya just said about yirr pride in America and saappirtin’ da troops. Son, ya get yirr aass right up in da chair and it’d be an anirr ta shave yirr patriaatic naaggin.”

And with the finesse, patience, and hands of a skilled surgeon, this tonsorial tour de force gave me the works. He started by adding a few drops of Eucalyptus oil to a hot towel gently massaging the lubricant into my scalp, prepping the skin for the shave while at the same time relaxing me into a state of pure bliss. Removing the hot towel, Archie lathered on a combination of Murdock’s of London shaving cream and Grooming Lounge gel.

Next, he reached into his barber’s coat shirt pocket, pulled a sheathed razor blade, and said, “Like ya ta meet Sally, named ‘er aafter my graandmaa as she was da one daat taat me how ta bairber.”

Pulling off the sheath, the shine and polish on Sally caught the sunlight coming into the shop shooting a laser beam of light into the mirror nearly blinding me. Archie reached down by the side of the chair, grabbed the thick weathered leather strop to clean and sharpen his prized Sally smoothing out any small scratches and notches so that blade would slide perfectly across my skin.

“Aire ya ready der, sonny?” he asked.

I was ninety-nine percent on board, but still had a smidge of doubt when I looked up at that seventeen inch TV, watched the last hostage disembark as his family ran up and hugged him, and that sealed the deal. “Let’s do this Archie,” I confidently replied.

The big barber started at the top of my head, shaving in the direction the hair grew, guiding the razor against the grain to remove it as completely as possible as he worked his way from the front to the back of my dome. Even though his shop was warm, I could feel the cool air nip at my naked noggin. With most of the follicles gone, Archie turned his focus to carefully shaving around my ears without nicking the skin once. The man was an artist, a craftsman, a virtuoso.

After about twenty minutes, he placed Sally back in its sheath, then back into his coat pocket.

“Are we done?” I asked.

“Wirr done wit pairt one, da shave. Now it’s time firr pairt two, pruhtect da shave,” he replied.

Part two was sheer heaven. Archie washed my head with soap and water then applied a cold towel closing the pores to help minimize redness. Removing the towel, he applied Proraso Aftershave to keep the skin on my scalp moist to avoid any itching or tingling. Lastly, he delicately massaged in Jack Black Moisturizer to protect my skin from becoming dry and cracking.

He rubbed the last bit of moisturizer into his powerful yet gentle hands, clapped loudly and said, “Okey, dokey, time firr da big reveal.”

See remember, I was facing away from the mirror during the entire shave and hadn’t seen a thing. So, I gave Archie the thumbs up, and he swung me around.

WOW!

HOLY SHIT!

I HAD A SHAVED FUCKING HEAD!

“Whattaya tink der, Douggers?”

I took both hands and carefully, deliberately ran them across my shaved scalp now soft and smooth as a baby’s bottom.

Archie sensed my apprehension, so he chimed in, “Well, ya know what dey say, bald is beautiful.”

“They do?”

 “And ya waanna know who says dat da most?”

  “Who?”

  “Udder bald men,” as he guffawed and clapped his hands loudly.

  “Is there anything I need to do to take care of my scalp?”   

“Take diss oil aann rub it aan tree, firr times a day?” he answered.

“Do you recommend I put any sunblock on?”

“Ya would ‘cept it’s win’er in Chicaago, so don’t tink you’ll need ta worry about sunscreen firr anudder six muntz,” as he smacked me on the shoulders and laughed boisterously.

Archie then unsnapped and pulled off the protective cape. I got up from the chair, reached for my wallet, when the sizeable shaver gently grabbed my hand.

“Yirr money’s no gaad here taday, irr whenever ya need a shave or a trim, ya gaat dat son?” as he again saluted me and gave me the biggest, warmest bear hug of my life.

Archie walked me to the door, and we exited his shop. One thing I hadn’t taken into consideration with a freshly shaved head was the impact of the freezing frigid minus twenty-seven degrees wind chill factor would have on my follicle free naked noggin. Imagine your worst brain freeze experience eating ice cream or slurping down a Slurpee, and times it by a thousand. Archie saw me shaking, shivering.

“Haad a feelin’ you’d be taad cold der Douggers. Dis aata help.”

The big man reached into his back pocket and handed me the thickest, warmest, Chicago Bear’s beanie ever made.

“You sure?” I asked.

“Woodin’ have it aany udder waay,” he kindly replied.

I slid the stocking cap over my chrome dome and immediately warmed up.

“Thanks Archie.”

“No, tank you firr maakin’ my day,” as he saluted me one last time and proudly marched back into his unforgettable Noyes Street Barbershop.

What had started out as a silly drunken “Dry Gin Jan” bet ended up as a life changing moment as I popped into to see Archie regularly for shaves, trims, haircuts, and hilarious stories over my last two years at Northwestern. And while I lost that initial bet to Pizza Face, memorialized in a classic Polaroid as no iPhones back then, it set me up for the rest of my life as from that initial failed “Dry Gin Jan” in 1981, I’ve happily done a “Dry Jan” every January for the last forty-two years.

And while Dry Jan for most is all about not drinking alcohol, I take Dry Jan one step further as the morning of every Jan 20^th, no matter where I am, what city I’m living in, what job I’m working at, I find an old time barber shop with an old time barber, I follow the ritual of walking back and forth in front of the shop until the barber invariably comes out and engages me in conversation and as we ultimately walk in, I tell the Archie story and get my head shaved to honor Archie, those original sixty-six American hostages, and to memorialize that original bet.