Faith that Kept Me

“All glory comes from daring to begin” ~ Eugene F. Ware

I couldn’t quit…..

     When I first became a barber I was around 12 years old.  I started in my father’s back yard.  My first customer was my cousin Billy; he wanted a fade haircut. At first I was nervous because at the time the only experience I had was watching my father cut his hair.  I began cutting and taking my time which took me about one hour to do one haircut, but when I finished I was shocked at how good of a haircut it was.  I knew from that point that this must be my calling.  My cousin was my number one walking advertisement. When everybody in Morgantown found out that I could cut hair, it seemed like everybody wanted a cut.  So my idea for going into this career wasn’t about the money, but the joy of seeing people smile and feeling good about themselves after getting a haircut.  To me that is my joy in being a barber.  I always cut hair on the side to make up for lost money from my fulltime job.  In high school I put barbering to the side, because being a teenager I wanted to run the streets and hang out with friends and I didn’t have time to cut hair.  I always cut my own hair and my families’ hair, keeping everybody looking good.  After high school, when I attended college I was a newcomer and had to use my hustling skills which was cutting hair.  So when I met with the dormitory director I told him that I was a barber and he said, “can you cut”? I told him yes, and if you let me show you I think you would like it. I cut his hair and he liked it. He then told me how good of a barber I was and if I need a room to cut the guys hair in, he said I could use the office next to his the main lobby where everybody hangs out at. In my mind I was thinking it was a golden opportunity. I began to think back on what my grandmother had told me which “was no matter how hard life can get, just keep good in your heart”. So I applied that saying to all my decisions I made.  When the guys found out about me, I was Mr. popular, cutting everybody’s hair.  For me it was just a hustle to make money on the side, so I didn’t have to stress my dad out for money.  Independence was something my dad always preached.  The bad part of cutting hair on campus is once you do a good job, everybody expects you to cut their hair all through the day and night, and mind you I was only working between classes.  Guys would knock on my door all through the night wanting a cut. So I had to make a schedule so everybody knew what my hours were.  It worked for awhile, but some people didn’t respect the rules. Being the nice person I am and loving what I do, made me work hard and go beyond the call of duty to keep people looking and feeling good about themselves.  After my sophomore year, I moved off campus, so I wouldn’t have people knocking on my door all the time, and I could have some privacy.  I took a break from cutting hair for a while, so I can focus more on my school career, because my goal was to graduate on time, and to keep my grandmother happy.  After I graduated college I wanted to challenge myself by helping people that’s in need. So my focus at that point, was working with children with behaviors. I worked at a group home in Charlotte. I have always the compassion in helping children. As I went through orientation and started reading the history on the children I would be working with, I realized some of them had been through similar situations as I had been in.  It was an easy transition for me in working with them, because I understood where they came from and where they were trying to go in there lives. Not knowing that I would be using my skills to help the children, I was then asked to cut all the male clients hair and the owner too.  I started noticing then that cutting hair is what I should to be doing.