Barber Shop, At a Theater Near You

I must say I was a bit nervous as Wendy and I walked into the barber shop down the street from her house. We took our seats in the rectangular room replete with old (ripped) vinyl chairs that lined the south wall and four barber chairs on the other side.

There were two barbers working on heads at the opposite ends of one another, one of whom was an eight-year-old boy who cried at the touch of the guardless clippers. He was concerned that he was being shaved bald, or near bald, because his sister apparently laughs at him. Shortly after we arrived, a man came in carrying a box full of DVDs, titles such as Seabiscuit, Bad Boys II, 28 Days Later, and Pirates of the Carribean.

He was kind enough to have brought a portable DVD player so as to show potential purchasers that the pirated movies were of decent quality. We sat and listened to the banter, thinking that, perhaps, I had fallen in an unwritten line and would soon be called to the chair. But this wasn't the case. About 20 to 30 minutes after we arrived, we were finally acknowledged:BARBER 1: I'm all booked up today so you're gonna have to ask him (glancing to BARBER 2).

BARBER 2: (looking up from his sniffling eight-year-old) I've got a guy and his son coming in and another guy and his son coming in. Which one of you wants a cut? (I put my hand up a few inches. He walked over to the clock and pointed at the times he expected his clients.) One is coming here and then there so maybe about 1:45. 2.

WENDY: So you've got time at two?

BARBER 2: Yeah. What's your name?

ME: Catherine.

BARBER 2: Catherine? I'm Jewels. What do you want done?

ME: A number two on the sides and back faded to the top.

BARBER 2 (JEWELS): Ok. Ok. I'll give you a good cut. I'll be looking for you at two.

ME: Ok. Cool. We'll be back. So we left. I wasn't thinking too much about the experience. Of course all kinds of thoughts kind of went through my head but I'm used to that so I didn't bring up the conversation. Wendy did, though. She asked if I thought we weren't talked to initially because of the interracial-ness; our queerness; my mixed-ness; or gender. Whatever, I say. Jewels was cool and I was looking forward to a haircut from him. Unfortunately, when we returned at two, he still had a couple of people in front of him. So it wasn't to happen.

He was trying, though, by offering alternatives, which I told him would not work out because I would be in New York. After this, we went over to the Haight to get Wendy a haircut from a friend of hers who works at a salon. There is a barber shop across the street, so I went over there. A small sign on the front of the door alerted patrons that it was a black-owned business. I was entering a racial space, something that wasn't made as evident to me at the previous establishment.

I walked in to a much nicer looking place: nice chairs with floor ashtrays in front, mirrors everywhere, driers, etc. The bald man in a guayavera looked up at me from the head he was working on and just looked back down. There was a man waiting in one seat and a kid in another. After the barber finished with his client, he glanced at me every once in a while. I asked finally if he could fit me in. In a practically inaudible voice that emanated from his barely moving lips, he said: yeah. Or maybe it was more like ye-. I was not feeling the love. I should have worn my guayavera.

I had my journal with me and decided to go back and read some of what I have been writing recently. After about 15 minutes, I decided I didn't want this guy's energy on my head, in my hair. So I left. And that was that. After surviving Wendy's tenuous San Francisco driving, my barber shop activities, no haircut, and a double cappuccino at a great cafe on the Haight, I trudged on, hanging onto the knowldege that my departure from California was finally drawing near.

Wendy and I went back to the salon to pick up her friend and we went to a place called El Rio. It's a bar. And the site of my New Year's Eve dating game show and subsequent lap dance in front of 300 women. It was cool being there again. What was even better, besides the Bailey's on ice I had, which I keep forgetting how much I love, was that there was a trans performance evening happening. We arrived during a set by a guy named Jacob whose words meant a lot.

Before I say why, I'd like to go back a bit and discuss something that I don't think I have before here. A friend told me something about what a friend of hers said. He's a transgendered guy who lives in San Francisco and he made the comment that butch lesbians with big breasts are wrong. Uh, 'scuse me, mother fucker? Interestingly, the friend who told me knew she shouldn't have said this to me but she did anyway.

So, of course, my mind began racing. I'm rather well-endowed up top, which is something I've always hated, especially in high school when I had to fit into a tight basketball jersey. So this fool makes this comment. I felt a little betrayed, which was, perhaps, stupid, because I don't know him and he wasn't speaking to me. But coming off a semester when I did research on transgenderism fits in with the gender binary, I just felt a little, well, hurt. And pissed.

I began thinking about this division between/among all of these identities. Butches, femmes (beautiful specimens they are, by the way), transgendereds, transsexuals, queers, "accurate" gays: do we all hate each other? What was his motivation for that comment?

There was some hatred toward butches in that comment and that bothers me. There are dykes who don't understand why femmes like butches. They often say: "If you want to be with a person who looks like a man, why don't you just be with men?" A little homophobic, wouldn't you say? Comments like that are painful for me to hear. It leads me to believe that if I go into a bar, will other dykes be detesting me because of my queer identity? Am I welcome in this establishment that is for queers? I don't feel welcome.

Do transmen think butches are wannabe transmen? I haven't written much about this anywhere. I've only composed the sentences in my head. So I'm not sure if it's even coming off eloquently enough. But I'll continue anyway. So this type of marginalization within the queer community irks me. And then I go out onto the street in society and I get looked at all the time. I notice it most times.

But Wendy is not with me most times. So yesterday, she notices I'm getting looked at. And we talked about it. And she told me that people just aren't used to seeing folks whose constitutions they have to translate. What happens is that sometimes I actually forget. Believe it or not. So when I'm reminded that people need to check some stuff off in their heads in order to understand themselves in relation to me, it gets on my nerves. It gets old. If I'm in a good mood, it's no big deal. I see it for what it is. And I understand. And I tell myself that I will work to change the world so the only thing people concern themselves with is respecting others' differences rather than being threatened by them. I'll write, I say to myself. But then sometimes I'm in a bad mood. And my eyeybrows fall into the space between my eyes, which gives me that menacing look. I'm working on exploring my role in all this. How do I represent myself within a society into which I don't necessarily fit nicely? How am I perceived in this space? How do I operate within the power structures that exist? But there is a problem with that because it is not Me vs. Society. It's all ideology. It's all structure.

And none of it has a beginning. I see things in pictures a lot, mostly sports metaphors, interestingly enough. And what I see is something like a dialectic. It's not a true dialectic in the Hegelian sense of the word, but I see that, because there is no origin to the power structures that we all find ourselves operating within, it's instead a unit that is given life, a kind of forward momentum, that will hopefully one day run its course. The markers that give the unit its meaning will lose the power they have.

By markers I mean clothing, music, hair -- anything that individuals and society in general use to identify. So when someone looks at me, they will not see an indecipherable gendered being, but rather a person with cool earrings. They will not run through a list of races and ethnicities to see if I am presenting myself in a racially acceptable way, but will instead concern themselves with ensuring I have enough space to walk by them. And they won't be angry when they can't figure me out.

Men won't be threatened by me. They won't question when an attractive woman who doesn't "look" gay is using my shoulder as a pillow in Union Square at 5 a.m. They'll just keep walking by without caring. They won't stare. Men won't feel they can pick up on her. And they won't hate me for reminding them that she is not interested in them. They just won't care. Back to El Rio. Jacob was onstage and he was rapping. About society. And stuff. And I remember he said something about transgendereds. Then he mentioned butches adding beauty. And femmes. And it was nice to hear. This is how I got started on all of this. I'm sure he doesn't feel the same way about big-breasted butches as the fool did. I went up to him after his set and thanked him for his words. I liked being there. But I soon had to leave to go to a housewarming party, which I didn't have much fun left. I'm sitting in Wendy's livingroom watching West Wing on Bravo with her laptop at my fingertips.

Apparently this is a dangerous thing. I can't seem to stop writing. I'm looking forward to going home. My flight arrives at 6:55 a.m. Tuesday and it seems so far away. My trip out here has been good. I just want my bed. That's all.

I've got some vital California statistics to share with those of you who may still be reading: 10 Number of times I transported myself and my luggage to a specific house.

3 Number of beds I slept on.

3 Number of couches I slept on (one of which was a futon couch without a mattress. I had no choice because the house I was scheduled to stay at that night had a toilet that became inoperable. The mattress was already in use at the alternative house so I had to deal with it. But I slept because of the Benadryl I took as a result to my reaction to the cat.) 1 Number of futons I slept on.

7 Number of cats I encountered.

3 Number of spiders I had to kill.

3 Number of cars I drove.

A lot Number of cell phone minutes I used. I'm sure I'll think of more. I'm sick of carrying my duffle bag. Of fitting my bathroom necessities in a bag. Last night I cleaned out the toothpaste that had exploded in the bag. And sleeping on couches. I'm thankful for them. But I'm sick of them. I want to stretch out. In my bed. On my sheets. In my room. Ok. I'm finally done. I'm going to a BBQ with Wendy tonight. Hopefully it'll be fun.