Party All The Time

In my last Retrospective, barely a month ago, I had just received my Purcy Chair and did my first pop-up in the park. I chuckle as I write this because writing this Retro is the first opportunity I've taken to reflect on my first month, based on that one set-up. At the time I stated my goal was to create opportunities to cut more hair and develop a Chicago-local community that is down with the JFDI-ness of getting better and better with every cut?

Well... it's working 😄

Create opportunities to cut more hair. I've had a pop-up going 4 of the last 5 Saturdays in Portage Park. I've had two in-bar pop-ups, each now a monthly thing: I'm at Cary's Lounge the second Thursday of a given month; at Happy Day Tavern on the fourth Thursday. I did a pop-up at Proksa Park on a Disc Golf League Night. I did a House Call for my favorite westside bbq, Tips & Toes that is a Father's Day Pop-Up going on next Saturday, June 20. I'm backing up a younger classmate's first pop-up for Juneteenth in the Dan Ryan Woods on the Southside Thursday, June 18. That's 7 pop-ups in the last month, and six scheduled into July (and I have two back-to school pop-ups in the queue for maybe 8 pop-ups in August).

Develop a Chicago-local community. In all, I performed at least one haircut at every pop-up and a total of 35 additional haircuts in the last month to the practice I got at Barber School. In there are a few return clients, who either were cut by me before or got a haircut by me in Portage Park and now I'm kinda their regular guy. One guy brought his mom, who had a beer while he got a fade. I made a house call for his mom the next week. Now we're scheduling when I'm going to touch up her roots for some haircolor.

Down with the JFDI-ness of getting better with every cut. This last pop-up yielded compelling opportunities to grow my skills in ways they probably wouldn't otherwise develop while I'm in school, based on the kinds of haircuts I get at the Barber School.

Boo joined me on Thursday and helped out by taking all these great pictures, which was good because once I get going on haircuts I don't stop as long as people want haircuts, and on Thursday I took six clients from 5:30ish to 9:30, and if I had more energy in me I could've taken more cuts.

Anyway, as I was setting up, Pete of Cary's Lounge was very excited. "This is so cool! We're gonna do this monthly! Yeah?" Fuck yeah, Pete.

I hadn't unpacked my barbering gear when I had a taker for a haircut, Andy, who just wanted a shears-only trim on a very healthy head of curly 50-70% grey hair. Okay! Shears practice! Sectioning! I can do this.

While I'm working on Andy's haircut, Raphael asks if there's a signup sheet – I've never needed a signup sheet before!!! Boo's on it and I look over at the mass of hair on Raphael's head and realize a) I'm actually going to have takers for free haircuts at this bar; and b) several folks haven't cut their hair in months; c) some folks have been cutting their own hair for a while.

Managing a lot of hair is not something I have a lot of experience with, both for myself and as a student barber on the westside. I just don't see a lot of long hair and what few clients I've had with longer hair, they each wear a graduated cut.

Raphael was the first to want a fade into long hair.

I ended up learning a lot about how to better manage hair as a result of getting to work with Raphael. Just... not in that moment. If Raphael is up for me doing a little touch up work next month at Cary's Lounge, I spent a lot of my day-after working with the longest haired mannequins in the shop. Erskine, the owner of the Barber School, took time with me that day to coach me through different scenarios, specifically for working in confined spaces like a stage.

Anyway, next up was Surly, and this dude was a treat to serve.

Surly asked for a burst-fade, something I've only attempted once and didn't nail the assignment. However, earlier last week one of my classmates was doing a burst fade for a client and I happened to capture the whole thing on video, so... JFDI. Like my classmate, Willy, I shaved a path with my clippers, above Surly's ears, and faded out from there into this existing shag. When I got the fade even, I started work on evening out his cut up top and along the fringe as he was looking to transform his shag cut into more of a mullet. That was all... fine. But when I was able to see the path into shaping his beard, the whole look really popped.

Anna and her partner, Zach, are artists visiting from Dallas. For all they know, cutting hair in bars is all we do in Chicago as this was their first Chicago bar experience. You're welcome ;)

I asked Anna what she'd like to do with her hair and she said to me "whatever you think is best" and given how fine her hair is and the disconnections from vibe styling, I really focused on smoothing the perimeter of her hair as it falls so she can keep doing as she likes with it, wearing it up, but maybe it might fall more gently.

Beto just wanted his sides tapered. Easy-peasy lemon squeeze. Great guy. Easy cut. Was a nice breather.

Zach got in the chair right at 9pm as my last client of the night. He pulled up an Inspo (inspiration) pic of an MMA fighter with a mullet that's kinda an undercut fade. I knew I could do what he wanted; after practicing on Friday with mannequins I know I could do this cut better next time.

I came into May on solid footing and went into "hedghog" mode focusing on my goals for doing pop-ups and keeping myself open for all the good stuff that might just be on that path. So far June is filled with opportunities. My hands are strong. My mind focused. My heart, full.

At the first in-bar pop-up at Happy Day Tavern, I was joined by three classmates. We only took two cuts the whole night, but our instructors came out and we partied. It was the first time since becoming a barber student I had a drink (let alone several) with my classmates.

On Thursday, I didn't have my classmates but IRL friends showed up and to be up there, once again trying to do something, but to have people who were there just to support... even my mom came by the park on Saturday with her pottery classmate's family.

Yeah, my heart is real full going into this summer.