Simms Jr. likes being bald. But, he sometimes misses his hair. Here’s why.
Ahhh. Black barbershops. Those secular cathedrals of the African-American experience. Once you enter them, you enter an ultra cool pocket galaxy. You engage in endless intense, hilarious conversations about politics, sports, and women. “Is LaBron better than Mike?” “Which Kardashian sister is the hottest?”” Why do you like Drake?”
The main event, however, is the haircut. Sitting in the chair, telling the barber what kind of haircut you want, and then letting him perform his magic on your hair. While he argues with another barber why LaBron isn’t better than Mike, why Khloe Kardashian is kinda coming up (ask your black friends what that means), and Drake is the new Tupac.
Sigh. The black barbershop. One of the coolest places on earth you could ever go to.
Except, I haven’t been to one.
In 10 years.
Because, I don’t have hair any longer.
Well, I have it, but it’s thin. And, I admit, I’m kinda vain, so I shave it. Don’t get me wrong, I like my bald head. And so have the women who’ve complemented me on it in the last 10 years. I actually rock it pretty well.
But, I can’t lie. Sometimes, I miss my hair.
Once, long ago, I had a mane. A full head of hair, man. I had hair like Bobby Brown in ’89. I actually would laugh at my friends who’s hair started thinning in their 20’s. “That’s not going to be me!” I thought.
And then, 1998. I was 25 year old, watching a Friends rerun with my then girlfriend. I had my head on her shoulder, when she mentioned halfway through the show that my hair looked “funny”. I asked her what she meant, and then she told me to go look at it. It looked, to her, like some of my hair on one side was “missing”.
I did. I went to the bathroom, and saw a divot in the left side of my hair. And I went nuts. My mind raced with questions. Was it being cause by stress? Did the barber make a mistake and nick my fade (my favorite haircut of all time.)?
That was the beginning of my faulty follicles. For the next decade, I watched as my hair went from Bobby Brown to Roscoe Lee Browne. I tried to “save” it briefly. Black barbers (I don’t know if barbers who cut straight hair can do the same “tricks” with coarse hair that black barbers can. If so, someone can enlighten me) can do “tricks” with balding men, so that their hair doesn’t look too bad. But, I felt like a fraud from a cosmetic aspect. I decided that in 2004, I was going to get my Lou Gossett Jr. on and just go full cue ball.
Since then, life hasn’t been bad at all as a bald man. And , male fashion/beauty has evolved so that many men who have thinning hair opt right away to go bald. Not to mention that some of the premier sex symbols of the day (Taye Diggs, Boris Kodjoe, Bruce Willis, Vin Diesel) rock the clean pate look.
But man, sometimes, I miss my hair.
Photo Vox Efx/Flickr