Monthly Archives: September 2002

Shaving is a task that many men perform on a daily basis.  Electric or razor, Remington or Mach III, the object is to remove the hairs on the face and trim up the bits where you deliberately want fuzzies. 

A straight razor is a throwback to the ancient ages.  A whip like ribbon of steel honed and stropped sharp that hasn’t changed much since Roman times.  A straight razor shave is not always something you’re taught to do by Dad when you’re a young lad.  But barbers of the old school know how to do a proper straight razor shave.

I keep my hair short, a Number 2 guard, all over the brain case.  This kind of cut I can get anywhere.  Even people with hooks for hands, just kicked out of hair cutting school can do a Number 2 all over, so getting that cut is easy in a strange town.  Look for a First Choice, or SuperClips and you can get it done.  I needed a cut, so over lunch yesterday in Indianapolis I spied a Barber Shop and rolled in for a cut.

Two barbers, both about nine hundred years old, one working and the other nursing a coffee, were watching TV and chopping locks respectively.  Ron, the unbusy one offered to cut my hair.  We gabbed for a bit while he buzzed away with the clippers.  Then, as he finished up the basic chop-it-off, he used a razor to trim around the ears and back of the neck.  Not an electric razor, but a straight razor and hot foam soap.

I remarked it was unusual to see anyone who still had a straight razor, let alone knew how to use it.  He said he always did a neck trim this way, as that was how we has trained to do it years ago in barber school.  Note the differentiation:  Not Hair Cutting College, or Stylist Studies or Colour College, but Barber School.  He had to learn how to shave a man, how to cut his hair, how to shine shoes and the hardest courses, Hygiene and Business.

Ron had been a barber all his life.  It was his trade, profession or avocation.  I asked when he had last done a real shave.  He said a few weeks.  “Men just don’t ask for a shave anymore.  They don’t know what a proper shave is.” he said, quietly. 

I stepped up.  “How about a proper shave then Ron?”  “Certainly Mister Smith.”  He put the headrest into the barber chair and a length of tissue in the headrest.  He leaned me back flat and asked if I was comfortable. 

Ron started with a soap and water mixture, rubbing it into my face along the beard.  Then a tap-water-hot towel, wrapping it around my face, covering my whole pie-hole, upper lip and all, pressing it into the skin.  Hot, but not uncomfortably so.  Then another towel, hotter still, letting it sit on the skin until just barely cooled.  A third, hotter still, as I breathed through the hot, moist air.  I started to relax, enjoying the moment.  The towel came off and I heard the sound of a razor stropping across leather.

A light touch with his hand as he rubbed hot shaving soap into the beard, asking if I was ready.  “Certainly.” I replied.  The razor came close and started dragging my beard away with gentle, deft strokes of the razor.  Holding the tip of my nose to one side, gliding away the stubble over the upper lip.  Tilting the head back so he could concentrate on the neck, adding a little more soap and foam to get the best angle and comfort for me.

At the conclusion of the actual shave, Ron washed off the last of the soap with another hot towel, letting it set to cool the skin.  Whisking the towel away, he massaged a mixture on my face.  I asked what it was he was putting on me.  “Just a bit of aftershave for you…”  Smelled like a mix of Old Spice and Aqua Velva, a Man Smell.  Stung a bit, but then again, it was supposed to, to close the pores of the skin.

Ron sat me back up, turning the chair to face the three way mirrors.  A perfect hair cut.  A perfect shave, as smooth as my face has ever been since the hair fairy brought me a beard.  I stood up.  He brushed off the stray hairs that might have penetrated the barber cloth and whisked away any dust or imaginary creases from my shirt, adjusting my collar to its correct position.  “There you are Mister Smith.  Just right.”

I paid, willingly, 25 dollars for a shave and a haircut.  A haircut done by a craftsman and a shave with a whip of stainless steel, done by a craftsman who instantly became an Artist.

We’re going to be frank here.  Not because we’re sensationalists, but because we have no fear and no shame.  We’re going to talk about Balls: Testicles, Nuts, ‘Nads, Ballsack Bouncers, Bollocks, Chin Slappers, etc…

Men are taught from the Days of Boys, that protecting those two little lumps of gristle and flesh is critical.  One swift kick in the crotch at the age of four, or an accident with a bicycle crossbar teaches a lad that he can experience pain of a depth and duration that is indescribable to 51% of the population.  Mom can’t understand it and Dad just laughs as his little son is now becoming a Man.

Men’s underwear has a few functions in common with women’s underwear.  One is to keep sweat from soiling your outer clothes.  Another is to smooth out the hang of your duds.  And, of course, to muffle farts.  These are understandable performance issues that can communicate across genders.

There are differences, of course, but these are simple mechanical alternations, like the Y-front for stand-up urination or the little satin bow on the waistband that tells women where the hell the front is.  Men don’t have a need for the little bow: If you put your underwear on backwards, your balls will tell you quickly.

Now, I’m a briefs guy. Other men are boxer boys.  It depends on how you were brought up or what you like.  I like support, holding the balls just right.  Not too loose and not up in my throat.  Let me know they’re there, but keep them happy and content.  I suppose the female equivalent would be an underwire bra, versus a sports bra:  Keep ’em from causing uproar but don’t tie them down like a boat in a hurricane.

Therefore, laundering your underwear, as it is so close to sensitive members of the body of man, is important.  When I travel, I always take about two weeks worth of underwear with me.  There is nothing more dispiriting than dipping into the hotel drawer and finding plenty of socks, shirts, ties but nothing to keep the boys happy.

I send my laundry out to the hotel on the road, asking for heavy starch in the dress shirts and laundry for the rest.  They don’t get this in Austin.  I now have survived two weeks with heavy starch in my shirts AND my underwear. 

Imagine strapping cedar roof shingles to your breasts, ladies.  Zero comfort.  Itchy.  Scratchy.  And having it climb up the crack of your ass like a hungry weasel with a bag of carrots.  That is how the past two weeks have been.  Constant adjustment, furtive scratching and the occasional pause to de-floss the butt crack.

But this morning, I did laundry in the hotel guest laundry, sort of like a two machine laundromat. After it was all done, I pulled on a pair of warm-from-the-dryer, soft, cottony, elastic ball comforters. 

The boys are now happy.  And so am I.