A Hair-Raising Experience

During the Great Indoors Period™ (aka lockdown), I had a problem.

My hair had gone rogue.

It no longer resembled a haircut. It was more of a hedgerow. Possibly a wildlife sanctuary. A family of blackbirds had moved in. The sparrows ran tours.

Still, no sign of barbers reopening. So, I turned to that vast digital emporium in the sky: Amazon. And I bought clippers.

Proper ones.

Multiple blades. Beard-trimming attachments. Rechargeable. Possibly capable of orbital launch.

The beard needed sorting too. It had grown to Viking-at-sea levels. I kept losing spoons in it.

The clippers arrived. The delivery driver obeyed social distancing by hurling them over the fence. No matter — they were well padded, possibly in Kevlar.

I made a decision:

Buzz cut. The full dome.

A few millimetres of hair. Freedom. Aerodynamics. No more styling faff.

Mary was… unconvinced.

“Your whole head?”
“Yep.”
“Won’t you look like a criminal?”
“Only if I wear the hoodie.”

She nodded with the cautious approval of a woman mentally composing her alibi.

Saturday arrived. We prepped. Kitchen chair, floor covered in decorator’s sheeting. I suggested Mary wear wellies — the hair situation was that dire.

She fired up the clippers.

BUZZZZZZ.

Approached my head like a woman defusing a bomb.
One confident swipe. Hair tumbled.
Another. More hair fell.

Third swipe — and she froze.

“OH MY GOD. It’s making you BALD!!”
“It’s meant to,” I said. “It’s a buzz cut.”
“No. Nope. I can’t. It’s too severe. You look like a convict in witness protection.”

And she left the room.

So there I was: two neat runways shaved across my scalp, surrounded by panic hair. Like a startled badger halfway through a makeover.

Well, sod it.
I powered up the clippers.
BUZZZZZ.

Swoosh. Swipe. Clumps fell like tumbleweed in a spaghetti western.
More swooshing. Hair bolted for the corners.

By the end, I’d lost several pounds in hair. I was lighter. Possibly even hovering. My beard was now a beard, not a biological threat.

Cleanup took two days. We filled the wheelie bin with decorator sheets full of fuzz. It growled when we shut the lid.

I liked the result. Felt clean. Minimalist. Aerodynamic.

Mary surveyed me with the calm horror of someone staring into a police line-up.

“Please don’t go anywhere public,” she said.
“Why not?”
“You’ll get arrested. Or startle horses.”

And she wasn’t wrong.
Even the pigeons flinched.