“Which do you recommend, lamb or pork chops?”
“Lamb,” I replied, boastfully.
I of course had no idea, but people listened to my advice and seemed contented. It was no problem. It was not like I was being tested on something. People never asked whether I recommended lamb or pork chops then bought both, went home, compared them, and came back the next day and complained. So it was all very easy. When people asked what was the best sausage meat, I just pointed at something and said:
“This is tasty and delicious.”
I spoke to people. I really liked this job. There was a big barrel of salted meat, and there were many women every day who came to buy salted meat. I handled it with the same professionalism as everything else.
“Can I get a cut from the spine?”
“Sure,” I replied cheerfully.
I stuck the fork down so it was submerged in the barrel, stabbed something and raised it up in the air.
“That’s not a cut from the spine.”
“No, hahaha, I just got a bit confused.”
Then I just stuck the fork on the next piece and raised it up the same way, and so it went until they saw the bit they liked. Guðmundur was extremely pleased with me. I worked hard, and I thought it was all very exciting. I even began to wonder if this wasn’t something I could see myself working at in future; I thought the men who carried the meat around were pretty cool. They were tough guys with aprons that were always bloody. Maybe I could have some future with meat. I could definitely learn it. I admired the way the meat industry men took whole carcasses and sawed them into separate pieces, like chops and cuts of lamb leg and thighs and spine. But despite the fact that I dreamed of being a meat industry worker, I was mainly a punk and an anarchist. There lay my real vocation and ambition.
I had long been considering getting a mohawk. I had repeatedly seen this hairstyle in Melody Maker and Bravo. There were real punks with mohawks. The singer in The Exploited had one. There was one punk in Reykjavík with a mohawk, and that was Bjarni from Masturbation, who was also my friend. He had gotten the nickname Bjarni the Mohawk because he made a big deal about his hair. He had a wide stripe, but I wanted to have a narrow one like the singer in The Exploited. Getting a mohawk was a statement, and as a result one became more punk. It said something about a person: that the person was brave, that he didn’t listen to his parents, that he was independent and had his own ways. A very specific statement. I knew that if I discussed it with my mother, she would never allow it. I decided to get myself a mohawk without asking anyone, neither king nor priest, nor even Mom. I discussed the matter with Fat Dóri. He immediately offered to cut my hair. His father owned electric hair clippers along with several combs and some shaving things. Dóri trusted himself entirely to cut my hair and found it exciting, so I just decided to strike while the iron was hot and get him to shave off my all my hair with the exception of a stripe down the middle of my head. He shaved me with the clippers and crowned his work by smearing shaving cream on my head and shaving the rest off with a cutthroat razor. I was extremely pleased with the results. This was very much a next step towards independence, as I saw it; it would arouse the admiration and envy of other punks. Together with a plastic leather jacket that I had bought at the Kattavinafélag flea market and the punk signs and dog collar, I was finally starting to resemble the punks in Bravo. I’d also amassed quite a collection of ripped jeans that were all thoroughly marked-up with a series of band names and slogans. Moreover, I also had some well-worn military boots with which I was extremely pleased. The army boots were an integral element of punk style — you wore your pants over the boots, of course, because if you tucked the pants down into boots, that was like Nazi style. I also had a green military coat my mother had bought at the secondhand clothing store, and I had naturally scrawled anarchist signs and slogans all over it. My mohawk totally crowned my punk creation. I was finally complete. I selected the date of my shearing for when Mom was in London with her friends and I was home alone with Dad.
The next day I went as usual to the meat counter in Glæsibæ. Of course, I took off my punk outfit before I arrived at the meat counter; I wore my rubber boots and put on my white apron. My hairstyle immediately attracted great attention and curiosity from the meat workers. People were surprised and asked why I had gotten my hair cut like this; many thought it was out of order while others laughed and thought it was funny. Before I knew it, Guðmundur, the store manager, turned up anxiously at the door. He stood in the doorway, and it was like he had totally lost any expression. I smiled happily at him.
“I got myself a mohawk.”
Guðmundur was clearly not as happy with my mohawk. He asked me to come back and talk to him.
“Why have you done this with your hair, Jón?”
I tried to explain to him that I was a punk, and it was a normal part of being a punk, that it was the fashion overseas; I tried to explain my case by saying that there was also a punk in Reykjavík who had a mohawk and that he was called Bjarni the Mohawk. I tried to point out that there wasn’t anything unusual about the situation. It was just fashion, and he was an old guy who didn’t get fashion. I was confident that I could explain it to him, but he just didn’t get it. I brought up various examples, told him about the singer from The Exploited and Wendy O. Williams, the Plasmatics’ singer. Guðmundur was silent and just listened indifferently to me. I finally fell silent. The silence became embarrassing. Guðmundur looked at me almost as if he felt sorry for me.
“Isn’t it okay?”
“Isn’t it okay?” he groaned. “Jón, Jón. What do you think the old ladies who have been shopping here for years, for decades, will say when they see you at the meat counter?”
I hadn’t thought about that. Would they care?
“Uhh, I don’t know.”
Guðmundur shook his head with a sorry expression and then went away. After that, I was taken off the meat counter and put behind helping the meat industry men. After lunch, I was moved down to the warehouse, where I was put moving boxes of bananas around. At the end of the day, Guðmundur asked me to come and talk to him in his office. There he sorrowfully announced that he could not have me at work anymore because of my hairstyle and so he was forced to get some other person to take over my job. He said he was sad about all this, but he made it very clear that he could not justify having me there anymore. This totally flattened me. I didn’t expect it. I always thought Guðmundur was a cool guy and so had thought he would just understand. But he did not understand in the slightest.
“You don’t need to come back, Jón.”
This was a huge disappointment. I’d been fired once again. And I had enjoyed it so much there and felt so good. I had even started to ponder whether maybe my path lay in the meat industry. It was a huge shock. I went away sobbing, got changed into my punk clothes and walked home, stooped down. I was totally devastated. I regretted having shaved my mohawk, and I knew full well that Mom would get angry. But then I also felt that Guðmundur was being unfair and annoying. I was extremely sad and depressed by it all. When I got home, my dad was sitting inside the kitchen listening to the radio and drinking tea. He was in high spirits and said: