What Happened in London

by Rodney

One visitor to this site developed a taste for slicked hair by having his hair greased every day as a small boy. But what happens if you have one encounter with Brylcreem and your parents never again allow hairdressings of any kind? Here's what happened to me.

I was about four-and-a-half, the year was 1960. We went for haircuts at what seemed quite a smart barber's in West London. My father and I were done at the same time, which meant he could not keep an eye on me. (He used water on his hair and only water; there was never any thought of encouraging me to do likewise; it was a necessary evil, made necessary by the unruliness of hair in middle age. One prerequisite for having grease on in childhood is that it is already in the house.)

Just when I thought the ordeal of cold steel and electric clippers was over, I felt my head being smothered with something cold, oily, strange-smelling and -- to me at the time - frightening. I must have registered my protest because my father's attention was attracted as soon as the deed was done.

I cannot recall exactly what it felt like -- that has gone, like other traumatic experiences; only that it was a nasty thing that could not be undone. My mother explained that "by the time Daddy saw, then the man had done it" and promised "we'll get that stuff off in the bath tonight", which duly happened. I was still puzzled though, and (as often) bothered by things I did not understand. Why had the man put this stuff on...? "Well, they probably get a lot of mothers from the town coming in... and they like their boys to be very stiff, and shiny, and smart!" I remember touching my head in puzzlement on descending from the chair; and again in the Underground, seeing my gleaming hair reflected in the darkened window. By the end of the day I understood that a towel couldn't return everything to normal: whatever this stuff was, it was here to stay...

From then on my parents were careful to forestall attempts at using hairdressings of any kind. At the next trip to the barber my mother was on the lookout: "I don't want him to smarm grease all over your hair." The ban continued long after I had begun to go to the barber alone, on into my teens; in fact it was never formally lifted. Being me, I was never tempted to defy the rule: in any case there was no way I could have it on at the barber's and remove all trace of it before arriving home.

The impossibility of ever having grease on my hair - and perhaps, also, knowing that given the opportunity I might not have the nerve for it anyway -- gave rise to a fascination with it. The lingering memory of West London made me think of grease as something nasty, frightening, imposed from above and to be dreaded. A myth grew up that has filled my private world ever since.

I have an idea something happened independently of the barber shop incident. I have a memory of going to the bathroom one hot afternoon and (managing without a comb) plastering my hair down with water - in direct imitation of my father's daily habit. I was told off by him gently: "It's all right for me, you see, because I know exactly how much to put on." I can make no connection between this and the visit to the barber, which means it may have happened earlier. It shows how fearful my parents were of my hair being dressed in any way, or even wet; after shampooing it was dried as quickly as possible, as if they feared me catching cold.

Primary (elementary) school brought a new experience - a boy a term below me who had Brylcreem put on his unruly hair every day; the smell of the great product, in my memory, goes back to exactly here. With or without the already distant memory of the West London barber, my curiosity was aroused. I wondered what it might be like to have greasy hair all the time. Along with the imagined thrill and dread went a growing desire to have my hair slicked, and not any old way but the nasty, grown-up way, with hair cream, the stuff that didn't dry off.

At one point I was allowed to play with partings in the bath with my hair wet - before shampooing. My mother uncharacteristically helped out with a comb and mirror. She even commented: "You look like a boy who's got grease in his hair!" I puzzle over why she raised a subject she would have wanted to avoid. And on two occasions I asked her point blank why I couldn't have grease in my hair. She replied: "Well, it makes your hair collect the dust, and the dirt... and really makes it thoroughly dirty."

I can recall no discussion of the subject after that. My fantasies became a deep secret.

By age seven the obsession was gathering pace. In spite of the impact of the Beatles on young men's fashions, more young boys seemed to be using grease, though probably fewer than in the 1950s. Whether this was by their own choice or parental insistence I could not tell. Probably they all had it put on once or twice at an early age, having been better prepared than me, thought it quite natural and did not make an issue of it. It was not a "fashion" and seemed largely a matter of personal preference.

I have made it sound as if grease was a constant preoccupation. Not quite: it had high and low periods of importance. These are difficult to chart because I can only remember them by association with the games of the time, which are themselves difficult to place in chronological order. Certainly the boy heroes I invented from six or seven onwards had greased hair. But there were periods when the idea of smearing your hair with anything seemed silly, and times when I was interested in quite other things.

Take the time I stayed with my grandmother when I was eight. One day a shampooing produced rebellious twigs and she said she'd "have to put a bi' o' brilliantine on that..." I cannot remember my reaction; perhaps I thought she wasn't serious, or vaguely prepared to stop her, remembering the rule. I had no chance: next morning before school she came from behind and plastered my hair with the semi-solid brilliantine she used to set her own. It was only my second encounter with a hairdressing ever, and the last for some years. Yet it triggered nothing; I recall no particular feelings at the time, no immediate comment from schoolmates or teachers at this sudden departure from custom. I do recall my mother on her return: "What's this stuff in his hair, Mum?"

Moving up to an all-boys grammar (high) school, I found the popularity of hair cream waning, even on speech day (annual prize-giving) and for the school photograph. Around 1970, when I was in adolescence, it enjoyed an unexplained, modest revival. A secret fascination now began to interfere seriously with my sexual development.

The secrecy of the obsession was as great as that of masturbation. Inevitably secret thought and secret activity became linked. The thought of greased hair brought on feelings of pleasure and pain, as I relived the barber shop experience.

Thus was born a sexual fantasy, a way of achieving orgasm that has remained ever since. It compounded the problems caused by my natural tendency to introversion and spoilt any chance of a proper encounter with women. Girls -- at that time -- were obviously excluded from any fantasy involving hair cream.

It was in 1970 that I took the bold step of purchasing, in complete secrecy, a small jar of Silvikrin (a hair cream similar in composition to Brylcreem, slightly cheaper), smuggling it into the bathroom and applying it for a brief moment of pleasure before each hair wash over the next few days and weeks. Encountering at first hand what had become an invented memory since the first encounter, back in early childhood, was quite a step. I was risking a parental reprimand even at age 14, if only for disobedience. The hair cream looked and felt more or less as I'd expected; but I remember mouthing "Christ, this stuff's heavily perfumed!" It took nerve actually to apply it as I had little idea what it would take to get it off.

Inevitably, on one occasion I overdid it and the shampoo failed to do its job. My mother noticed the lingering greasiness next morning, assumed it was adolescent glands working overtime and ordered a second wash. The practice lasted the life of the jar, almost, until I was overcome with remorse and disposed of it discreetly.

The advent of wet-look gel in the early 1980s had interesting consequences. I took an interest in women with heavily slicked hair but could not see this as a way of getting rid of the fetish. Nevertheless a whole new set of fantasies could be created around the exquisitely gelled heads I passed in the sunlit streets of Italian hill towns or admired from a distance in the pubs of Islington Green (London). One of the finest women I ever saw was a bookshop manager in Central London, snappily dressed with bright red lips and dark hair cut very precisely and slicked back immaculately; I spent many a lunch hour "book browsing". (Since discovering this site and its links, my interest has centred on the Greaserwomen one. The latter has been full of revelations, for instance that some women enjoy slicking as a pure activity and that a few actually prefer cream to gel.)

In the 1980s I came to terms with the situation. I lived abroad for five years in Continental Europe and the Gulf, thought things over and decided it was foolish to fight a deeply rooted tendency that would never be quite suppressed and could resurface to ruin a marriage. While keeping an open mind about marriage and a normal sex life, I ceased worrying about it. I travelled alone, visited Singapore and Malaysia where I was amazed to find myself surrounded by well greased males.

Finding myself a long way from anyone who knew me, I got the habit of greasing to my heart's content, free at last of any fear of embarrassment. Brylcreem was the natural choice, not least because it was widely available. One of my best experiences was going a barber shop in central Italy, having almost the full works -- shampoo, cut, conditioner -- and then with my hair in tip-top condition being able to grease and style it myself to perfection. I kept the style I'd always had (apart from a medium-length phase as a student), a short back-and-sides with a left parting and usually a simple quiff.

In 1985 I settled in London where, in spite of uncertain domestic and work situations, I have remained ever since. My social life has been compartmentalised, meaning I can still slick my hair when seeing one circle of friends, while another knows nothing of it. (It's all a matter of judgement. As many visitors to this site probably know, sadly not everyone likes hairdressings on other people.)

In 1989 I discovered Slick from the Body Shop, a gel-based cream with an exquisite smell and an unusually high gloss. Like all gels it shampooed out easily but had a drying-out effect, and made my hair difficult to put right after the wind and rain of England. I kept using it for a good 10 years, though, until its formula was changed and it lost its scent, its hold and thus much of its appeal.

So it was back to grease. I take advantage of trips to France to get hold of Pento, a traditional hair cream with a similar formula to Brylcreem, made by Sara Lee and in a reassuringly bright red tube. When in Germany I stock up on Hair Tabac Haarcreme, a brilliant invention in more than one sense, in a green tube, unfortunately only available (as far as I know) in Germany. It's a hair cream that allows you to correct a windblown style but also washes out easily. Important for me, leading my separate social lives.

I never cease to wonder how I might have developed if things had been only slightly different. Would the fetish have developed and remained?

Suppose the barber shop mistake had never happened. Suppose at the same time that my father had kept a jar of Brylcreem on the bathroom shelf, if only for his own use, occasional or otherwise. How curious would I have been and could he have been persuaded to let me use the occasional dab? The local barber my parents settled on was not in the habit of applying grease to youthful customers, only spray. But another one might have kept trying to grease my hair, keeping the possibility near. What if I had been sent to boarding school, or orphaned and taken on by relatives who had quite different rules?

Suppose, too, the basic attitude had been different. My parents might have seen using grease on boys' hair as quite logical. How keen would I have been then? I speculate on how often and why I might have had it put on: just occasionally, every Sunday for church, each haircut, every other day...

I can just about imagine the smell of Brylcreem coming from the bathroom, watching the smearing and rubbing-in movements of my father's hands on his head... and then one day being aware of movement above my own head, the smell becoming suddenly stronger than before, my sensing it coming closer and finally feeling the first, deadly cold touch as my whole head is smothered.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if, when I had grease put on that first time, I had not found it alarming or unpleasant, merely puzzling; and if the washing off had been postponed. I would have known greased hair just long enough to remember clearly how it felt long afterwards, instead of more or less having to invent a memory. Would a fantasy still have grown up, perhaps in a different form? The one that did grow up was driven by two factors - grease being forbidden, and grease being experienced once as something nasty, frightening and to be dreaded. If the second factor had been missing, any fantasy would surely have been diluted by real life experience.

It is a pity in any event that I did not have a close male companion who used grease regularly and with whom I could have discussed the subject openly. I would have touched his head, asked him what it felt like and generally demystified it all -- done everything except try it myself in fact.

My parents had very genuine reasons for not wanting me to use grease. They feared having to control something they knew little about. If only they had known where the suppression would lead... It is difficult to see how mere events or circumstances could have made things turn out differently. They were who they were: suspicious of anything they had no experience of themselves. If every boy in the community had used grease every day it would not have pressured them into concessions. It would have taken a combination of circumstances at the least, and different parents, for me to have boosted Beecham's profits.

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