re: summer cut

Vacuum cleaners, garden shears and electric hair clippers

Why would all three of these be mentioned in the same breath when discussing the hair cut of a two-year-old little boy? Because they are all the same thing.

Follow along please.

Susan threw-down the notion that liam was crying in the photo do to the new haircut that he’s sporting. Such a refreshing and economical do on that guy if I do. First off, let’s dismiss the idea that liam is upset with the appearance. No need to spend too much time on this but let’s just remember that he rocked a mullet for the better part of 18 months to begin his life.

Perhaps the tears came from this extremely awkward sensation across the scalp or that buzzing, roided out bee noise in his ear. I have to admit, that might be a little weird to experience for the first time. Problem is, this is not the first haircut. Back in January, liam received his first snip-snip-clip at the hands of yours truly. Yes awkward, yes noisy, but most of the emotional and verbal responses were a smile, continued laughter, and the word “tickle”. I guess it could have been “pickle”…not always sure. I mean, he can say “milk” and he can say “shake”, but for some reason we are always enjoying a nice frosty “hupshake”.

So here is the theory –

1. Vacuum

The boy has a thing for vacuums. It is by far the strangest love/hate relationship I have ever seen between human and household appliance. Liam has now, for months, been obsessed with the vacuum. And that’s any vacuum…anywhere. We have even made trips down the vacuum isle of walmart and target as rewards for being such an awesome kid (jealous?). He freaks out when he SEES them, always reluctantly walking up to touch it but still craving it. Like that giant bruise you get on your shin from a 2-year-old wielding a baseball bat. If left well enough alone, you’d never even know it was there, but you just keep pushing on it to see how much it still hurts or how much pain you can take. Now when he HEARS it…whole other ballgame. We have had a couple of nights in which every ten minutes or so, we have heard the repeated calls of “vacuum, vacuum, vacuum, vacuum…”. Very freaky, but it seems to fit with the family. If it’s on, he can do nothing else but track it, afraid of what it might do to him if he loses sight of it. Any object/appliance that makes a loud humming noise (hair dryer, leaf blower, hair clippers…) must be a vacuum in the mind of the obsessed.

2. Garden shears

Liam and these have become recently introduced… a budding friendship that has shown great promise during the brief but frequent encounters in the garage loading into the car. He has really been into to the tools that hang on the wall in the garage. These are referred to as “daddy’s tools” or sometimes “daddy’s toys” and consist of a leaf-blower, weed-eater, several shovels and the recently relocated garden shears or as we have named them “the clippers”. Ah…see where I’m going here? “dangerous” is another tag associated with them. Usually, along these lines, “those are the clippers. They are DANGEROUS. They can lop your fingers off and then how will you ever be a professional baseball player?” Ok, so we don’t say the last part, but I like playing the part of the overly aggressive sports dad pushing his son all the way to the major leagues. The only other things that I can think of that have been given the “danger” label by mommy (aka – fun police) is fire and motorcycles. Surprise, surprise! Two more of Liam’s favorite things.

So this all leads to…

3. Electric hair clippers

We placed liam up in the make-shift barber chair (his high chair). With his backed turned to me, I flipped the clippers on and he began whipping his head around trying to see and said “vacuum?” as he heard the noise. After saying it a few times, I told him that these are clippers to which I can only imagine the confusion that set in. Get a mental picture of this device that must have been running through his head as I worked that hair over. The uncontrollable shaking and tears can only be expected. Perhaps I need to be a little more careful with my choice of words from here on out.