Mr. Clyde.  What can I say about Mr. Clyde, given that I can’t remember his last name, if in fact I ever knew it.

Well.  Actually.  A lot.

Mr. Clyde was a dark-haired man of average height, powerfully built, and hardened both by life and, owing to conviction on a charge of manslaughter, by seven years spent at the Texas State Penitentiary at Huntsville (aka “The Walls Unit”), the state’s oldest prison, with legislative roots in the Republic of Texas and one-time host to John Wesley Hardin, Duane “Dog” Chapman, and my former upstairs neighbor in Austin, Paul _______.

Somewhere along the line Mr. Clyde became a licensed barber.  But when I met him, men’s grooming as my grandfather, father, and I knew it was being displaced by hairstyling.  The razor cut was the new big thing and men were unabashedly getting familiar with long-time staples of women’s coiffing – hair spray and mousse.  And Mr. Clyde was bent on getting recognition of his abilities, beginning not with a barbershop, but with a lobby-access men’s salon in the La Quinta Inn complex in Arlington, Texas, where in the early- to mid-60s he was knocking down $15.00 a head.

I don’t remember who told me about him, but it doesn’t matter.  Mr. Clyde made me look good and I went in for a touch up every three to four weeks and in one very important way, he did business just as any traditional barber would, with small talk.  That’s how I got his story and he got mine.

It’s also how I eventually wound up not having to pay the fifteen bucks anymore.

As the notion of men’s hairstyling was taking hold with the help of hair product purveyors like the 1960 start-up brainchild of Jheri Redding and Paula Kent and now ubiquitous Redken, highly publicized product and technique demonstrations masquerading as competitions were being staged in major cities, including Houston.  Winning one of Redken’s faux competitions would boost Mr. Clyde’s business, but he needed a model.

Even though my hair is very fine and by age 18 was already thinning around the crown of my head, Mr. Clyde thought I’d be the perfect choice because once styled it would pretty much stay in place unless I got it thoroughly wet, like in the shower.  And it absolutely didn’t matter which brand of whatever hair styling product he used.  In fact, he actually didn’t need to use any.  Just wash, cut, blow-dry, touch up, and spray.

A Redken competition was being held in Houston just a few weeks away and he was set to pay for the whole thing – Hotel, meals, flight, and incidentals and no matter whether or how he placed I would never again have to pay him to do my hair.  All I had to contribute was a clean head of hair that clearly hadn’t been prepped for the competition, which was timed.  So, I went without a haircut for about a month.

When it came time to get down to Houston, we didn’t have to deal with airport parking issues tickets, baggage checking, etc. because one of Mr. Clyde’s close friends was a VFR-certified and licensed pilot who owned a four-seater Piper Cub, probably one or the other of the Super Cub line, and he volunteered to fly Mr. Clyde and me down to Hobby Airport just outside Houston and stay over to take us back.  So, the only worry for any of us what the weather between Arlington and Houston would be like and in the event it was overcast and the ceiling was low but not prohibitive.

We made it to Hobby at early dusk and it was then that things got what I as a congenital noticer call interesting.

First, we had to take a cab from Hobby to the Rice Hotel in Houston and as soon as we’re in the cab Mr. Clyde asks the driver if he knows where to find some good entertainment and I’m thinking, “What?  Man, it’s Houston.  What’s to ask about?”  The driver said he did and a few minutes later he stopped at a two-story building in a seedier of the city with a garage below and a residence above.  Mr Clyde then got out of the cab and headed up the stairway and when he was let inside the driver said, “Let’s go get some coffee.” and pulled around the corner to a surprisingly inviting classic diner.  Thirty minutes later, Mr. Clyde joined us for a cup of his own and then we were off to the hotel.

Things next get passing strange when we showed up at Redken’s fake competition for which Mr. Clyde was a dark horse.  I mean, it was a sponsored event and virtually everyone in the place, including the spectators and local style reporters, knew who was who and the other competitors were known Redken followers.  But nobody had ever laid eyes on Mr. Clyde and the room was suddenly abuzz about this masked man who showed up with razor, scissors, water bottle, blow-dryer, hairspray, bib, and model, but without any Redken product.  The judges were nearly palpably suspicious and inspected my hair way more closely than any other’s and the tension ratcheted up about three notches when they found no sign of preparation in advance.

When the thirty-minute bell sounded the end of the contest Redken had a BIG problem – There was no denying the quality of Mr. Clyde’s work.  However distasteful it might be and to whatever degree he might have cast a pall over the event and the importance of Redken’s products and techniques, with style reporters on hand Redken wasn’t gonna get out of the room alive if they didn’t acknowledge Mr. Clyde’s tonsorial prowess, just as he had predicted going in.

So, they gave him the third place trophy and $1,000 cash prize and off we went, gigglng and laughing and poking each other like third-graders.

Not only was it a good day for Mr. Clyde, with clear skies and calm winds, it was a great day for flying.

Almost.

Prior to the Redken trip I had never flown in a small plane and knew nothing more about them than what my father, who was qualified in the B24 Heavy bomber, the C-47 Skytrain transport, and the small, purpose-built Stinson L-5 Sentinel, had said in answer to my question about which he favoured.  He picked the L-5, “Because you can get killed in one of the big planes, but the little ones can only barely kill you.”

Maybe that accounts for my reaction to our landing in Arlington.

In the language of the trade, which I learned much, much later, we were crabbing in because of a crosswind.  But in the few seconds needed to recover from that crosswind having put that fuckin’ Piper up on its starboard wing in an attitude befitting an Immelmann Turn, I popped my seat belt thinkin’ I just might make out the port side before the damn thing went cartwheeling across the field.

Hairy situations.