Part 2: Dupré with the clippers

DUPRÉ WITH THE CLIPPERS
Written by Bert Plomp

With the arrival of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, the Christian atmosphere in the Plomp household came to an abrupt end. The Holy Scriptures were cast aside and made way for the first LPs by these renowned bands. Naturally, my parents remained faithful to their Christian idols, but quoting from the Bible before meals, or on any other occasion, was a thing of the past. Almost simultaneously, the dismantling of parental authority began. The local cornerstone of society, as embodied by my parents, was shaken so violently that it eventually collapsed altogether. Even before that, my younger brother Charles and I had been provoking our parents for quite some time: challenging them, especially in matters of faith. Before Charles and I were truly free to go our own way and be left in peace, particularly regarding our hairstyles, we still had a few hurdles to overcome.
I think I was fourteen, and Charles twelve, when I informed my parents that I had decided, albeit still regularly, to visit the barber at much longer intervals. To clarify the good intentions behind my decision, I presented them with a small picture of Our Lord. I would not rest until I had acquired the same splendid hairstyle. At my next visit to the barber, I intended to hand him the picture and discuss a plan of action. My parents wanted nothing to do with this plan. They were furious. What exactly fuelled their anger, I had no idea. Did they find it blasphemously presumptuous that I wished to resemble the Son of God? In terms of hairstyle only, mind you, not attire. Had I also appeared in the street dressed in such a robe, the shock might well have finished them off. It was only the hair that concerned me. It wasn’t only Jesus who had long hair: most of his companions, the disciples, did as well. The same applied to my parents’ former icons: kings, princes, generals, naval heroes, and magistrates. They all possessed luxuriant locks. And if they didn’t, if they had the equivalent of a milkman’s dog’s coat or were bald, they wore imposing wigs with long, thick, gleaming ringlets. I therefore refused to be deterred and carried on with my plan.
Once my hair began to grow over my collar, it became too much for my parents. Like other long-haired youths, I was suddenly labelled “long-haired riffraff” by my parents and by the rest of authority-loving society. To express my displeasure at this misplaced qualification, I put up a poster of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper on my bedroom door, with the warning above it: Beware of long-haired riffraff!
Before I reached my goal, my father repeatedly made frantic attempts to let a certain Mr Dupré unleash his hair-cutting urges on my head. Dupré was a friend of Ter Steege, a former colleague of my parents from their Salvation Army days. What set the man apart from an ordinary acquaintance was his possession of a genuine electric hair clipper. The device was large enough to shear a full-grown ram in no time at all. In fact, shearing sheep was his main source of income. What often deterred sheep and other warm-blooded creatures from making use of his services was his cruel, almost psychopathic appearance. He was the sort of individual you would rather not encounter in the woods around a psychiatric clinic. Least of all if he happened to be roaming about with that fearsome cutting device in his hands. Nevertheless, my father always spoke very highly of this travelling barber’s skills. That enthusiasm was no doubt largely due to the fact that a Dupré haircut cost only a fraction of what a visit to a regular barbershop would. Moreover, once Dupré had had his way with you, so little hair remained on your head that you wouldn’t need another cut for at least six months.
I once showed Dupré my picture of Our Lord, but he had no use for it. His model book contained only one style: the “Heinrich Himmler cut”. In other words, a brisk, high-shaved crop clipped right up to the scalp. My father would happily walk the streets with such a look. Rather odd, really, for a former resistance man to present himself in public in that fashion. Since Charles and I had no interest in such a “Himmler look” and were far more drawn to hairstyles like those of The Rolling Stones, it was essential to stay as far away from Dupré as possible.
Incidentally, my older brother Theo had a magnificent head of curls that was admired by all. He didn’t need long hair to stand out. My younger sister Saskia did have long locks, but she was still very young, far too delicate to be exposed to such a shaving maniac. To avoid a confrontation with the executioner wielding the clippers, I often took charge of cutting Charles’s hair myself. He trusted me with it, believing that any result I produced would be preferable to that of the sheep shearer. Although I always cut his hair with the utmost care, I rarely managed anything better than a monk’s tonsure.