For the longest time, I’ve worn my hair in what could best be described as a modified buzz cut. All clippers, no scissors. A style that lives somewhere between “civilian trying to look presentable” and “Marine Corps recruiter might nod in approval.”

Never quite a full high-and-tight, but close enough that nobody would accuse me of spending too much time in front of a mirror.

Then came the pandemic.

Like millions of others, I suddenly found myself cut off from barbers, restaurants, and any reasonable excuse to leave the house. Four months into the shutdown, I caught my reflection one morning and barely recognized the man staring back at me. My hair had expanded in every direction. It wasn’t so much a hairstyle as a habitat. I looked like a lion that had just woken up from a long afternoon nap and was still trying to remember what year it was.

At first, I hid the problem under baseball caps. The cap became part of my daily uniform. Grocery store curbside pickup? Cap. Walk around the block? Cap. Sitting alone in my living room? Somehow still wearing a cap.

Then Zoom happened.

Suddenly people expected to see your face. Not just occasionally, but every day.

As a school principal, I was expected to have my camera on constantly. Administrators don’t get to hide behind profile pictures or claim their internet suddenly stopped working whenever they haven’t combed their hair. If I was leading a meeting, attending a meeting, presenting at a meeting, or simply thinking about a meeting, my face was probably on someone’s screen.

Unfortunately, so was my hair.

Every day I watched it become more ambitious. It expanded outward, upward, and occasionally in directions that seemed to defy both gravity and common sense. By month four of the pandemic, I looked less like a school principal and more like a wilderness survival expert who had just been rescued after several weeks in the mountains.

There is something uniquely humbling about staring at yourself in a little video box for six hours a day. Every stray hair seems to have its own ZIP code. My increasingly wild hairstyle wasn’t just noticeable anymore—it was being broadcast to dozens, sometimes hundreds, of people at a time.

The baseball caps that had served me so faithfully during those early months were no longer a viable solution. Apparently, “school principal headed to a doubleheader after the meeting” wasn’t the image I was trying to project.

Looking presentable had become a professional necessity. The problem was that barbershops were closed, my hair was staging a full-scale rebellion, and every morning I looked a little more like a lion who had wandered into educational administration.

Something had to be done.

And since barbershops weren’t an option, I turned to the second most trusted source of professional grooming advice: YouTube. The first being an actual barber. Unfortunately, the actual barber wasn’t available.

So I did what any self-respecting person with no training and questionable judgment would do.

I went to YouTube.

Ironically, the video that ultimately set me on this journey was made by a Marine. Of course it was. Somewhere out there is a Marine who unknowingly launched my amateur barbering career.

The first attempt was a disaster.

Actually, “disaster” might be too kind. It was more of an uncontrolled experiment in geometry. What seemed perfectly even in the mirror looked like a topographical map from another angle. There were ridges, valleys, and mysterious patches that appeared to have been attacked by a lawn mower.

After staring at the damage for a few minutes, I made the only reasonable decision.

Everything had to go.

I slapped on a #2 guard and buzzed my entire head into submission. It was the haircut equivalent of hitting the factory reset button.

Over the next month, I experimented. Every week brought a new adjustment. Different guards. Different techniques. Different angles. Some cuts were acceptable. Some were suspicious. A few looked like I had gotten into an argument with the clippers and lost.

Eventually, though, I figured it out.

Now the process is practically scientific.

The back and sides start at a #1, blend into a #2, and finish with a #3 on top. Two clippers. One trimmer. Fifteen to twenty minutes. Every seven days, almost to the hour, like some strange grooming ritual.

I’ve done it so many times that it has become muscle memory.

The ritual begins with the familiar electric hum of the clippers coming to life. The vibration settles into my hand. The blades glide against my scalp with that oddly satisfying scratching sensation. Tiny hairs drift downward like dark snowflakes, collecting on the sink, the floor, and somehow places that seem physically impossible.

My arms know exactly where to go. The wrist turns. The elbow lifts. The clipper follows the curve of my head. No thinking required. Just repetition and rhythm.

I still keep a mirror nearby, but mostly out of habit. Truthfully, I hardly need it anymore. Sometimes I’ll watch a movie while cutting my hair. Sometimes a YouTube video. Once or twice I’ve probably paid more attention to the movie than the haircut itself.

That’s how automatic it has become.

Which led me to a thought tonight.

Was it really muscle memory?

Or was I just giving myself too much credit?

There was only one way to find out.

So tonight, standing in the bathroom with clippers in hand and what some might call an alarming level of confidence, I decided to conduct an experiment.

I closed my eyes.

No mirror. No visual confirmation. Just the familiar hum of the clippers and years of repetition.

Up the back.

Around the sides.

Blend the fade.

Clean the edges.

The entire time I relied solely on feel—the pressure against my scalp, the angle of my wrist, the position of my arms, and the subtle change in sound as the clippers moved through thicker or thinner hair.

When I finally finished, I opened my eyes, brushed away the loose hair, and looked in the mirror.

Right on the money.

Apparently, after hundreds of haircuts, my hands know my head better than my eyes do.

Which is both impressive and slightly concerning.

But maybe that’s one of the stranger lessons left over from the pandemic. We all learned how to do things we never expected to learn. Teachers became video producers. Parents became part-time educators. Meetings moved into kitchens and living rooms. And somewhere along the way, I became my own barber.

What started as a temporary solution became a routine. Then a skill. Then something so familiar I could do it with my eyes closed.

Literally.

I’m not saying I’ve mastered self-barbering.

But if civilization shuts down again, I’ll be ready.

I’ll be the guy with the properly blended fade.

The blindfolded guy with the properly blended fade.

There’s more waiting at https://xinkblotz.com. Telling stories, sharing thoughts, and drinking coffee. A blend of fiction, reflection, and whatever’s brewing – one post at a time. 

© 2026 Mariano Velez ~ InkBlotz Press