Around a couple of tables there was a beauty shop and for a while there was a bit of life lost come back for the women and for an old guy standing to the side….
A FEW DAYS ago local reporter Bill Rettew did a feature on a barber in his 80s. The feature was about how the barber shop had become a bit of a museum of items the barber had collected over his life. But it brought back memories and tied into a “beauty shop” created around a couple of tables in the memory unit my wife lives in.
I’ve always felt there was something about a barber shop, or beauty shop, that brought about a feeling of community. Note I did not use the word “salon.” I am old. Back in my day we never would have thought to call these places anything other than a “shop.”
Movies have been made about them – think “Steel Magnolias” – and TV shows.
I remember as a kid going to the K&K Barber Shop in Wilmington, Ohio. When I was really young my dad would take me and I’d sit on the long bench and listen to the men talk about all manner of things. When I got older I could go myself and eventually some of the men would ask me what I thought about something. That was a real rite of passage.
My mother never missed her hair appointment and for years, had the same hairdresser. Her appointment was always at the same time so the women who were there became a bit of a club. When she was failing, she was adamant one morning that she keep her appointment, though she could hardly walk. So, I took her. Going into the shop she fell. We managed to get her into the chair before the EMTs arrived. She didn’t get her hair done and that was her last trip out into the world before she began the slide into death.
So, when I walked into the memory care unit the other day and saw Abby, the supervisor, sitting at a table with a group of women including Connie, I stopped to see what was going on. Abbie was doing their nails. Another staffer was “puffing up” hair. I realized that women who normally did not say anything, rarely smiled, were talking and smiling.
There was a something going on around that table that formed a connection with their pasts and so allowed them to step out of their dementia and talk, and smile. For that hour or so they were in a place they remembered, and no doubt treasured. They were at the beauty shop. When it ended they would slip back into the world of memories lost, but for that hour or so…how precious it was.
I left them alone with their memories of other times and places and walked out, but I wasn’t alone. I could feel that kid who sat on the bench at the K&K Barber Shop walking with me and I could hear the voices of old men long gone telling stories of times past when they were young. It all brought a smile.
Rich Heiland, has been a reporter, editor, publisher/general manager at daily papers in Texas, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio and New Hampshire. He was part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning team at the Xenia Daily (OH) Daily Gazette, a National Newspaper Association Columnist of the Year. He has worked as a consultant doing public speaking and training specializing in customer service, general management, leadership and staff development. He and his wife, Connie, live in West Chester, PA. He can be reached at [email protected].