ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, FL—Growing increasingly tense as he listened to the jovial back-and-forth exchange on his immediate right, local barbershop patron Dan Wilkes reportedly felt immense pressure Friday to live up to the conversation occurring between the stylist and the customer at the next chair. “Ugh, I haven’t said a word since my barber asked me how my day was going, and those two are over there chatting like old friends about places they’ve traveled to,” Wilkes reportedly thought to himself, becoming more uneasy as the two men moved effortlessly from topic to topic, at one point feeling a sharp, paralyzing pang of inadequacy course through him as the adjacent customer made a joke about movie reboots that caused Wilkes’ own barber to laugh along. “Oh great, now they’re talking about baseball. Maybe my barber’s into that? Shit, he’s already taking out the electric trimmer—I’m running out of time to turn things around.” Sources confirmed that after a terse question and answer about how long the man had been working at the shop, Wilkes spent the rest of the haircut in total silence.

Advertisement