Syd’s Barber | Victoria driving school | Vacant

Michael Colbourne
Sid’s, he cut my ear onetime when i was ten, he always had his lunch while cutting my hair.

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Patrick Coppinger

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A FEW DOORS BEFORE FRED’S LUNCH ON WESTON ROAD there was a small Barbershop called Sids. The front of the building was adorned with a single barbershop pole on the right side of the entrance between the door and the big front window, the red and white swirling paint was peeling on the pole, a testament to the poles age or Sid the barbers age. Sid lived up by Dufferin and Eglinton and I would see him at days end lock the shop up, pack his ‘good scissors’ in a towel along with his worn lunch thermos, his folded brown paper bag that held his sandwich and a pair of manual clippers placing them all into a dark brown briefcase with handles. He’d wait as night fell for the Weston Rd. bus heading south, his shock of white hair hidden under a small mans hat. A popular style of coat for men back then was often referred to as a trench coat, us kids called them spy jackets, you know the type, three quarter length tan khaki material, with broad lapels, real spy jackets had belts. Little Sid always wore a tie to work on top of an assortment of shirts that varied from white to pastel green and pink. An inexpensive blazer or jacket added more decorum underneath the top coat, nothing fancy, this was the fashion of the times, men and women would just get dressed up to go out. When your turn came for a haircut Sid would seat you in the shiny red leather barbershop chair and adjust the height with a crank lever at the side of the chair and lower you so you were at the right eye level, and with the other crank he’d get the correct angle to observe you, when I was quite young Sid had an upholstered board that acted as a booster seat, the booster seat was constructed so as to fit onto the wide arms of the barber chair. While waiting my turn I was engaged in observing the assortment of Barbershop tools, the bone handled straight razor that Sid used to shave behind the men’s ears,

after the shave Sid would put some nice smelling aftershave into his hands and ritually rub it in his palms and fingers then slather the fluid over the recently scraped areas, the neck and the sides behind the ears and the sideburns. Besides the razor there were two tall clear glass jars with chrome lids and the word Barbicide etched and painted on the front. Sid placed combs in the jars for sterilizing. The fluid in the jars was coloured a vibrant turquoise and violet. This cleanliness is associated with the Barber trade. Attached to the counter a thick leather sharpening tool was hung it reminded me of the ‘Strap’ that I had seen from time to time in grade school. Now and then I would see Sid using the leather ‘strop’ to sharpen his razor, the sound the steel made as it passed over the leather is unique. Then Sid would ceremoniously turn the hot water tap on and you could see the steam coming from the thickly enamelled sink and he would gather a bit of hot water to add to the foam shaving mug and he’d take a wood handled horse hair brush and use it to apply the thick soapy material to the customer in the chair, a man three times my age. There were a few hair products for sale in the spartan shop, tubes of Wildroot Cream Oil, glass jars with lemon coloured Vitalis hair tonic, stacks of the most popular men’s pomade of the day Brylcreem, ‘a little dab will do ya’ a few tins of Brilliantine a vaseline like product, and an advertisement for Grecian Formula with Rocket Richard of the Montreal Canadiens as the spokesman. Sid had large bottles of those hair tonics that he used to apply after the cut and there was an extra charge of five cents if you wanted him to use one of them afterwards. Besides the styling photos and the already mentioned iconic Triumvirate décor Sid had his price list nicely framed in an easily readable wall hung display, it was the type where the numbers and letters each measured an inch in height.

The numbers were red and the letters were white and each letter and number fit into a slot of the black fabric display case and as times changed and prices rose a shop proprietor could make small increases or announce a new product or perhaps the special of the day, or as I had seen in some shops, use the board to site a poem or herald the coming of the seasons. From time to time Sid would quiz me, mostly when the place was empty and the other clients had all left, he’d ask in a soft tone if I was behaving for my mother and not getting into to much trouble, and how was the baseball team doing, and school, he must also have been a Catholic and he’d ask all kinds of stuff, making small talk. There was a sincerity in Sid’s voice and he remembered the next time you came in the previous conversations and we’d start again on a more current note, his face would turn from barber to old friend in quick fashion and I could count on Sid to have a smile. Sid never once mentioned his life, I gather he was married cause he was that sort of man, a good man, he probably had children, grown children, but one never knows if the children were healthy or could have been stricken by polio or a mental retardation or some other malady and presented a difficult life, and if I sensed anything it is was a forlornness, a mind that wandered, perhaps back to his roots in Ireland and the circumstances that set him here in Canada. I would think to myself if his coming to Canada was sad like that of my grandfathers who was put on a ship when he was twelve with his brother Jack in 1904 along with thousands of other children whose parents had abandoned them, sent them to the New Land, because, well we always thought they could not be fed at home in Ireland, where there were only potatoes to eat, there was The Famine. The myth of a better life where food would be plenty and opportunities galore. White slavery.