Hair Cutter Man

He is in his 80's or even older.  He is a recently moved in tenant at the senior housing adjacent to the park.  First time he came he teased a certain 3 year old to tears about wanting to come into his house to take his hair at night.  Talk about terrifying to a 3 year old.  I talked him down, and we went to talk to the guy. Turns out his name is Joe and he worked at a local gas station till very recently.  Last time I bought gas there he tried to charge me twice.  When I told him I had already paid I saw a look of pain in his eyes.  Clearly he was aware that he was forgetting things.  Now he lives in this senior housing, new to this immediate neighborhood. But anyway, this little boy and I talked to him and  together we realized that he was teasing and wouldn't really come in at night and cut his hair.  Joe even took off his hat to show us that he had hair of his own, not much, but enough.  Much talking with the kids and their parents reinforced this sense of safety with this guy and his 'funny' joke.  

 

Over the next couple of weeks all the kids at the park made friends with this guy, who they call Hair Cutter Man.  He stays out of the park, but the 3, 4 and 5 year olds run around the fence close enough to allow Hair Cutter Man to fake grab at their hair.  Loads of fun.  Lots of practicing being brave.  

They started to just call him The Funny Man.  Yesterday  they all started a new game.  The kids would throw balls out of the park and The Funny Man would run across the street to retrieve them, even crawling under cars parked in the lot there.  I thought this had several potential problems so I asked the kids to stop throwing balls over the fence.  This is a rule we have anyway.   Somehow it seemed undignified to me to have this guy do this chore for the kids.  

 Next they start throwing shovels out of the park for The Funny Man to collect.  It is always hard to tell who is having more fun, Joe or the kids. Joe of course could have the fun of pretending that he wouldn't give them back.  And then there would be one kid who would believe it and cry.  Probably a 2 year old, or a particularly worried 3 year old.  I didn't like many aspects of this game so I put a stop to throwing shovels out of the park.  

A few minutes later I see a 3 year old throwing a Hula Hoop out of the park, and just about hit this 80 year old in the face.  I told them that they couldn't throw ANYTHING out of the park.  Being resilient they reverted back to the game of running along the fence for him to steal their hair.  

Today the kids are digging a huge hole in the sand and filling it with water that collected in every container from the rain that fell last night.  Along comes Joe.  Such excitement!  "The man is here!"  They run over quick as a wink and catch him at the fence.  How does this feel to Joe?  Jeez, how would it feel to me if I was 80 or more and just landed in senior housing?  It would make my day to have the friendship of these kids.  It would be the delight of my life.  

So today they have a new and very clever scheme.  The 5 year old boy, who is a natural athlete bounces the ball right at the gate and bounces it again till it bounces close enough for Joe to grab it.  Joe throws it with all his might and the kids go running.  They bring it back and all work on this job of mastering just the right bounce.  All happy.  And my rules of yesterday are all being followed.  There is a certain decorum to the play that works out well for all.  

It warms my heart to live in this neighborhood where all this can happen in the lives of these kids, and of Joe.  Young and old becoming friends.  Who among these kids will remember Joe when they are older?  A mystery.  But today as Michael and I were taking an after daycare walk, along comes Joe.  We joked with him, "Watch out!  We're gonna cut your hair!"  He laughed and took his hat off to show us his hair, and was on his way.  So were we.