A Cut Above The Rest
Rick Motta's Barber Shop is a quaint old fashioned establishment a few yards away from the post office in downtown Naperville. It has a red and white striped pole outside, the barbers wear black and white striped shirts, there's an ornate brass cash register and the seats are those big,comfy, black leather chairs that go up and down when the barber pumps the foot pedal.
However, there is a fine line between quaint and old fashioned. Quaint is when a brand new place tries hard to look like something historical. Old fashioned is where things haven't changed in the past 40 years and the customers become hysterical.
When Ross popped in for a haircut yesterday, the shop was bravely manned by three old retainers boasting a combined age approaching 250. I'm not sure what was worse, that Ross's barber could barely see across the room to use the remote control on the TV or the fact that all the chairs had their backs to the mirrors.
"Just a tidy up please," said Ross, confidently.
Bill began snipping away, squinting through his glasses like Mr Magoo. I was worried he would simply dye Ross's hair grey and shave a bald patch in the top so he would look like everyone else in the shop.
The snipping over, Bill then pasted some sort of gunk around Ross's neck and took out a cut-throat razor with the panache of Sweeney Todd.
Then came a strange sort of electrical gadget that looked a bit like an iron.
With this he proceeded to massage the neck and shoulder area, athough to be honest at first glance it looked as though he was going to give him ECT treatment.
I got really worried when Bill pulled a vacuum hose from the wall and began to use it not on the floor, but on Ross to hoover up clippings.
When it was done, the cut itself wasn't too bad, but for some reason Ross's hair looked as if it had been glued down with Brylcreem to accentuate his side parting. When I asked if that were the case, Bill assured me it wasn't, but started searching around for some, mistakenly thinking that's what Ross wanted.
Further on into the town is a children's barber where the young clients can sit in little cars to have their hair cuts. Maybe next time we'll give that a go...
However, there is a fine line between quaint and old fashioned. Quaint is when a brand new place tries hard to look like something historical. Old fashioned is where things haven't changed in the past 40 years and the customers become hysterical.
When Ross popped in for a haircut yesterday, the shop was bravely manned by three old retainers boasting a combined age approaching 250. I'm not sure what was worse, that Ross's barber could barely see across the room to use the remote control on the TV or the fact that all the chairs had their backs to the mirrors.
"Just a tidy up please," said Ross, confidently.
Bill began snipping away, squinting through his glasses like Mr Magoo. I was worried he would simply dye Ross's hair grey and shave a bald patch in the top so he would look like everyone else in the shop.
The snipping over, Bill then pasted some sort of gunk around Ross's neck and took out a cut-throat razor with the panache of Sweeney Todd.
Then came a strange sort of electrical gadget that looked a bit like an iron.
With this he proceeded to massage the neck and shoulder area, athough to be honest at first glance it looked as though he was going to give him ECT treatment.
I got really worried when Bill pulled a vacuum hose from the wall and began to use it not on the floor, but on Ross to hoover up clippings.
When it was done, the cut itself wasn't too bad, but for some reason Ross's hair looked as if it had been glued down with Brylcreem to accentuate his side parting. When I asked if that were the case, Bill assured me it wasn't, but started searching around for some, mistakenly thinking that's what Ross wanted.
Further on into the town is a children's barber where the young clients can sit in little cars to have their hair cuts. Maybe next time we'll give that a go...
posted by Hilary at
9:06 AM
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