“Just look as good as you can”

–Duke Ellington, probably

About a dozen or so years ago I found myself at a dive bar on a Friday night. Richmond used to have a handful of these types of establishments, adjacent to the hardcore and punk scenes, and personned by a crew of heavily tatted and pierced ladies and gentlemen. This particular establishment was called Empire, and it has long since closed and been replaced by some non-threatening eatery where the local college students can go with their parents and not have to worry about being vomitted on, kicked in a mosh pit, or getting a contact high. But back in the day this was a place to go for cheap PBR, colorful characters, hardcore shows and a sincere and unapologetic vibe. It was one of my favorite places.

Photo credit: Parker T. via YELP

I can’t remember exactly why I was at Empire, but as I was a single dude in my late 20’s there isn’t a very good reason to examine it too closely. Two good friends of mine ran a hip clothing store up the street where they had contracted me from time to time to do some building work. They had parties there regularly and they had cute friends and I’m pretty sure that’s why I was there.

I slid into a seat at the bar and started throwing back shots of Fireball. My friends have given me shit about it for years but Fireball is the light beer of whisky (I am using the term ‘whisky’ very loosely, but that’s what it says on the bottle and there are strict laws regulating these sorts of things). You can’t really drink six shots of Jameson in forty-five minutes and still be on your feet but you can with Fireball, though you might end up in jail. A few years ago, I was in New York for some gigs and we all went to this trendy little bar in Manhattan. After trying to order a shot of the Fireball I received a look of such sheer repulsion from the bartender that one might be led to believe I had horse genitalia growing out of my forehead. They didn’t even carry Fireball at this establishment, because why would a trendy little bar in Manhattan even consider Fireball, so I DID end up drinking Jameson but that is a story for another time.

Anyway, I was sitting in this packed bar on a Friday night, desperately trying to chat up this baddie sitting next to me. All I could get out of her was that she worked in banking. She probably saw all the Fireball I was drinking and decided I was one red flag too many, which I undoubtedly was. As that conversation was tanking, someone slid into the seat on the other side of me. She was an African-American lady, with dreads, tattoos, piercings, and a gold cap on her front tooth. She asked what I was drinking and I told her Fireball, of course. She ordered two and we drank them. Then she told me I looked like I needed a haircut and handed me her business card. Then she paid her tab, got up and left. Wait, what?

……

The next morning I showed up to the address on her card, a barber shop, around 11am. There was a pool table in the middle of the place and a couple big screen TV’s, a fish tank, and a French bulldog just walking around. The tatted, pierced, and dreaded lady’s name was Dot and this was her shop. I’d gotten decent haircuts over the years but I’d never been to a barber. I told her to make me look good. She sat me down and faded me out. I had a hot towel and straight razor shave. I walked out of there fresh as hell. I had no idea I needed that in my life.

Photo credit: Dot Reid

After that I got really curious about the nature of dressing well and looking your best. There are countless style guides, blogs, magazines, and tv shows on the subject and numerous little unspoken rules that come from several millennia of human existence. But rarely does anyone explicitly say why this is something one might want to pay attention to.

Presenting oneself well is a way of adding a bit of structure to a deeply unstructured world. There isn’t a whole lot one has control over in this dumpster fire of a world but a level of groomed-ness frees up some mental and emotional real estate to better handle whatever silliness gets thrown one’s way. It’s a whole lot easier to manage your life when you feel good about yourself.

And I had reason to give this a shot because there were some really rough years in there. There were the normal adult disappointments- being passed over for jobs, losing jobs, losing people, and the inevitable professional stagnation that comes somewhere between your post-college years and middle age. For many years my main goal was to be able to walk out the door in the morning feeling confident that I could weather whatever fresh hell the world was going to throw at me on any given day. I found the least I could do was have a decent haircut.

And to be perfectly honest that shit helped a lot. When I was working for rock and roll tours and I had to talk to important executives and celebrities and rock stars, I found my own individual style to be a sort of armor against the insane personalities and impossible tasks I had to deal with. I had one tour manager tell me that I did my job with grace, and that was one of the highest compliments I’ve ever received. A few years ago I found myself playing in horn sections for fancy wedding bands. I would go see Dot, put on my off-the-rack black suit from Target, and go to some country club outside of DC to play a wedding reception. The door would be opened for me- ‘right this way, sir’ the valet would say, and I would go do my job. I would wager that I was the brokest person on the premises at these functions.

On one hand maybe these are superficial and trifling things to consider in the grand scheme of it all. On the other hand, we live in a dynamic and physical world with millions of people with individual minds and individual biases all operating in a complex and volatile society. As a regular moron moving through said world, I find things go a bit easier when I can find a bit of terra firma in how I feel about myself.

So I go see Dot every couple of months. I never really tell her what to do: she just clips away the hair that doesn’t look like me and polishes up the rest. And I leave her shop feeling a little bit more like myself and a little less uncertain about everything.

Photo credit: Dot Reid

Recently she said she’d like a knife. I designed something slim and made a sheath that clips into the front pocket. I did a handful of them. I call them the Dot.

I like to cut a bit of jimping on the spine for some extra thumb grip:

Scribing where the cutting edge will ultimately be.

Grind the bevels, the swedge, taper the tangs, and drill the rivit holes:

Fire in the hole:

Quenched:

Polished:

For the bolster of the handle, I made some material out of an old pair of blue jeans:

Trim to size:

Grain of the material looks good:

Getting all the handle pieces fit up and drilled. I had some burlap micarta lying around so I used that for the main handle:

Remove parts you can’t hold:

All fit up and shaped up, ready for epoxy:

Clean up after epoxy cures:

Sand forever, then polish. Here it is at about 220 grit. We will take it up to 2000 grit and then polish:

The leather work- you have to do all the stitching and shaping first, then you soak the whole thing overnight and wet form the knife in the sheath:

Sheath on left has been wet formed. It takes forever but it gives a good fit, plus it can hide unwanted blemishes in the leather you may have made in the previous steps.

The Dot:

Dot ended up liking her knife so much that she got it a tattoo of it on here face:

If you are in the Central Virginia area, you should go see Dot at Refuge For Men. Tell her the Viking sent you, she’ll get you sorted.