Brandon's Turn in Butch's Chair

Brandon's Turn in Butch's Chair

My name is Brandon, and the last time I had a haircut was some three years ago.. I love my long hair but that will change today and there is nothing I can do to avoid the change except to leave my country forever.

Today is the the beginning of Compulsory National Service for me.

My National Service / Conscription boot camp hair cut was given to me by a hippy, his name was Butch. He was 6 foot, 8 inches, she was 350 pounds of solid muscle.

He daggum near scalped me!

"Keep smiling, everyone will wonder what you've been up to!" He said to the line of some 20 male recruits who marched into the barber shop in absolute silence.

The induction haircut is the regulation BUZZED CREW CUT style new recruits receive upon entering the armed services. With an induction cut, the hair is clipper shaved with no guard down to about 1/50" and is designed to strip away individual identity and create a unified team bond. This cut is especially well suited to the strenuous basic training phase of military life as it requires no daily care.

“Move it you flabby prom queer,” the drill sergeant yelled at me at the front of the line as I started to walk towards the chair.

“Faster, Faster, Faster,” he yelled and I moved it for the chair double step and jumped into it.

The Barber flung the green cape up over my head and it slowly fell over me like a parachute. He wrapped it around my neck and pulled my hair out from underneath it pulling it back over the chair. I sat there looking straight ahead at a white painted cylinder block wall. I was trembling a little and I could feel a huge lump in my throat.

He started pumping the chair up and I could feel her start to comb my hair out in the back. He was tugging at it a little trying to comb out the tangles. I heard a pair of scissors close and the sound sent shivers straight through my spine, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, I could hear them working fast back their and I could feel the weight of my hair falling away.

I couldn't see anything and I was completely numb. My eyes were starting to water up and I was trying very hard not to cry. He came around my left side and I glanced as the comb came towards my cheek and dug into my hair at my left ear. I heard the scissors again; snip, snip, snip, snip, and I glanced to my left shoulder to see locks of hair cascading down my shoulder and into my lap.

He then moved around to my right and I could feel the comb dig into my hair from the back into my ear, and the scissors came into my vision on my right. I watched as the blades opened as they moved towards my cheek, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, they cut fast into my right side releasing my locks onto my shoulder and into my lap.

He went back behind me and started combing my hair out on top of my head in the very front. I felt him hold a section between his fingers, so I glanced up as far as I could see. I barely saw the shiny shiny scissors in my peripheral vision but heard them again, snip, snip, snip, I watched as clumps of hair fell from the top of my head over my face and into my lap in front of me.

I could feel him quickly combing and combing on the top and then felt him hold a section and snip, snip, snip, more hair kept falling and falling over my face and into my lap. Butch did this all the way across the top of my head from my forehead to my crown.

I sat there trembling with my long hair piling up in front of me. Eventually he stopped work on the top and there was a pause for a moment. I then heard a pop and the hum as he turned on the clippers. I tensed up to try to stop myself from peeing in my shorts. He tilted my head straight down into my chin. I felt the clippers touch my nape and move all the way up the back of my head.

The high powered professional electric clippers were different from those I used to see at my local barber shop which I had not visited for more than 3 years. These clippers were very heave and silent.You see I had not cut my hair for the last three years at least. They moved swiftly pass after pass through the back and around my left side, and then the right side. Chunks of hair were raining off of my head and all over the cape.

He finally stopped and their was another brief pause. I heard a water bottle spray behind me and felt water on the back of my crown. I felt him hand ruffling my hair on top as she sprayed it wet all on the top. This stopped for a moment and I heard the scissors again. She started combing the hair at my forehead with the comb and snipping away very fast at the top, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, I could hear them work and little snippets of hair went raining from the top of my head over my shoulders and lap. I could feel the combing and hear the snipping very fast from my forehead to my crown, and at the top of the sides of my head, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, snip, as more and more snippets fell from my head all around me.

He worked very fast.

Before I knew it, I heard the clippers once more as he tilted my head forward again. I felt them buzzing up and down at my nape all the way through the back, and over both of my ears. Then he adjusted the clippers' blades and took swift passes across the top of my head. He turned them off and all of the action stopped.

I felt him undo the cape in the back and loosen it. I felt a very fast succession of bristles softly brushing my nape and neck as he was cleaning me up with a dusting brush. He did this all through the back, my neck and my ears, my forehead, and cleaned my face with it.

He flung the cape off of me, and my hair all fell to the floor all around me. I got up slowly as I felt very lightheaded. I walked out the exit way and into another corridor. And stood in line again. It felt very strange to not have any hair on my shoulders anymore. Everyone in front of me had been shorn too so the line looked very different now. I could feel the air on my neck and nape and my ears. I had no idea what I looked like and I tried to ignore it ever happened. Yes we had all been shorn thus our trestles and fleeces of hair had been removed by cutting and or clipping, sheering completely and without mercy, restriction or qualification.

We eventually got through the rest of the in-processing After receiving our uniforms and being assigned barracks we had our swearing in. It was about 8 at night when it all finished but the day was not over yet.

We were marched until 2 am and were finally aloud to sleep for almost 4 hours.

It wasn't until the next morning that I had a chance to look at myself finally when using the bathroom. It was very very short. It was buzzed pretty short at the sides and back with a tight taper and the top was a little under ½ inch in length. It looked strange on me but by this point I was way too exhausted to even care.

I ended up with the nickname 'Prom Queer' from the Drill Sergeants from then on. That one stuck all the way through boot camp but I didn't really mind so much.