Spoken With Authority
***(contains profanity)***
The barbershop. That’s where I first heard it. I was almost eleven when my parents let me go by myself.
“…this fucking big around!”
That one word spoken with authority, not in anger, but with masculine passion to put the point on a point! Jesus, it was like being thrust into the world of men, where men discussed things that required words with more amperage than the watered-down versions of profanity I heard at home.
No, this place was real, a place my father wouldn’t even fit in, a place that shot me skyward past my dad’s stilted station as husband, breadwinner, and swearing flunky, a place crusted over with stubble-faced old men leaning forward on rock-hard knees, a place where arms swung wide like the blades of arthritic windmills and gnarled fingers poked sternly into imaginary chests if a tale was to be told correctly, a place where no one was ever surprised, or shocked, or dismayed, a place where the story of one man’s tragic tale was met—with no attempt to top—by another’s in the spirit of solidarity, conspiring against the cosmos with the same tenacity the gods had conspired against them, a place where men’s spittle and fire fueled the gravity of every yarn and landed on your forehead if you were unfortunate enough to be sitting too close.
I can still picture that old man sitting there, blue shirt and matching pants, some sort of mechanic’s jumpsuit, an oval sewn onto the left chest of the shirt and the name Earl stitched elegantly in satiny scarlet thread. His hands were maroon and bent, the fingers amber near the tips where his cigarette rested. His face was a craggy leather bag, his skull narrow with thick slate hair rolling back in a natural wave on top, trimmed thin as sprinkled pepper down his neck and around his ears. His knees poked at the material of his trousers like the fat ends of Louisville Sluggers, while the bottom cuffs crept up his bony ankles exposing droopy thin white socks and black shoes sturdy as cinderblocks.
“A maple tree! That bastard was this fucking big around!”
Earl’s voice was a rusty razor on a grainy strop, his spittle glittering through the shaft of sunlight, red eyes narrowed like a killer’s, arms bear-hugging some invisible trunk for us to see. Us. He didn’t exclude me because I was a kid. A couple of times he even looked right at me, those big mitts of his clamped to his knees. Veins thick as lamp-cords crisscrossing the backs of his hands, winding around his wrists. Scared the hell out of me and the only words I heard for the duration of my time in the chair were cocksuckersonofabitch spoken as one word, and all derivations and compound varieties of fuck. I was astonished, terrified and relieved when the barber swung the apron from my chest with a matador’s flourish and held up the mirror for me to admire the back of my head. I nodded, smiled nervously and dug in my pocket for the crumpled bills, still picturing Earl clutching that bastard of a tree, praying I’d never see him again.
(This is a 500-word flash fiction piece I wrote a several years back about an impressionable eleven-year old Catholic boy (me), who, in the early sixties made his first solo trip to the neighborhood barbershop. That skinny little fair-haired kid was introduced to a raft of swear words he hadn’t even known existed!
The funny thing was, a few years after this barbershop incident, I started working at a local grocery store a mile or so from my home, Gus’s Market, and met Bob who also worked there. Bob was a few years older than I was, and we became fast friends. One day I went to his house after school and met his two sisters and his mom. Bob’s dad was also there that day, and I just about fainted when I recognized him as “Earl” from the barbershop!
It turned out his dad was a golden-gloves boxer in his youth, worked as a mechanic, and was just a regular guy. Earl even took Bob and me fishing several times up on the Missouri River and we had a lot of fun, though I’m not sure I was ever able to see Earl as anyone other than the rugged, sinewy dude sitting in one of the dark wooden chairs along the back wall of the barbershop. Earl of course never recognized me, how could he, but I never told Bob. Of course by that time I was maybe 15 or 16, and already swearing like a merchant marine myself!
Fascinating how the threads of fate weave in and out of our lives.)
Lonnie Busch
The barbershop. That’s where I first heard it. I was almost eleven when my parents let me go by myself.
“…this fucking big around!”
That one word spoken with authority, not in anger, but with masculine passion to put the point on a point! Jesus, it was like being thrust into the world of men, where men discussed things that required words with more amperage than the watered-down versions of profanity I heard at home.
No, this place was real, a place my father wouldn’t even fit in, a place that shot me skyward past my dad’s stilted station as husband, breadwinner, and swearing flunky, a place crusted over with stubble-faced old men leaning forward on rock-hard knees, a place where arms swung wide like the blades of arthritic windmills and gnarled fingers poked sternly into imaginary chests if a tale was to be told correctly, a place where no one was ever surprised, or shocked, or dismayed, a place where the story of one man’s tragic tale was met—with no attempt to top—by another’s in the spirit of solidarity, conspiring against the cosmos with the same tenacity the gods had conspired against them, a place where men’s spittle and fire fueled the gravity of every yarn and landed on your forehead if you were unfortunate enough to be sitting too close.
I can still picture that old man sitting there, blue shirt and matching pants, some sort of mechanic’s jumpsuit, an oval sewn onto the left chest of the shirt and the name Earl stitched elegantly in satiny scarlet thread. His hands were maroon and bent, the fingers amber near the tips where his cigarette rested. His face was a craggy leather bag, his skull narrow with thick slate hair rolling back in a natural wave on top, trimmed thin as sprinkled pepper down his neck and around his ears. His knees poked at the material of his trousers like the fat ends of Louisville Sluggers, while the bottom cuffs crept up his bony ankles exposing droopy thin white socks and black shoes sturdy as cinderblocks.
“A maple tree! That bastard was this fucking big around!”
Earl’s voice was a rusty razor on a grainy strop, his spittle glittering through the shaft of sunlight, red eyes narrowed like a killer’s, arms bear-hugging some invisible trunk for us to see. Us. He didn’t exclude me because I was a kid. A couple of times he even looked right at me, those big mitts of his clamped to his knees. Veins thick as lamp-cords crisscrossing the backs of his hands, winding around his wrists. Scared the hell out of me and the only words I heard for the duration of my time in the chair were cocksuckersonofabitch spoken as one word, and all derivations and compound varieties of fuck. I was astonished, terrified and relieved when the barber swung the apron from my chest with a matador’s flourish and held up the mirror for me to admire the back of my head. I nodded, smiled nervously and dug in my pocket for the crumpled bills, still picturing Earl clutching that bastard of a tree, praying I’d never see him again.
(This is a 500-word flash fiction piece I wrote a several years back about an impressionable eleven-year old Catholic boy (me), who, in the early sixties made his first solo trip to the neighborhood barbershop. That skinny little fair-haired kid was introduced to a raft of swear words he hadn’t even known existed!
The funny thing was, a few years after this barbershop incident, I started working at a local grocery store a mile or so from my home, Gus’s Market, and met Bob who also worked there. Bob was a few years older than I was, and we became fast friends. One day I went to his house after school and met his two sisters and his mom. Bob’s dad was also there that day, and I just about fainted when I recognized him as “Earl” from the barbershop!
It turned out his dad was a golden-gloves boxer in his youth, worked as a mechanic, and was just a regular guy. Earl even took Bob and me fishing several times up on the Missouri River and we had a lot of fun, though I’m not sure I was ever able to see Earl as anyone other than the rugged, sinewy dude sitting in one of the dark wooden chairs along the back wall of the barbershop. Earl of course never recognized me, how could he, but I never told Bob. Of course by that time I was maybe 15 or 16, and already swearing like a merchant marine myself!
Fascinating how the threads of fate weave in and out of our lives.)
Lonnie Busch
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GL
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Sep 16, 2024 11:55PM
Perfect details. I can see him (and smell the cigarette smoke and Barbasol).
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