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Season 6 of 7 Minute Stories opens in an empty Medina, Ohio barbershop where Saturday morning memories still linger in the air. Aaron Calafato reflects on childhood haircuts, family rituals, and the fear of familiar places fading away. But if we tell stories about these places, we may give them a chance to endure—and when those fears are confronted and embraced, we give ourselves a chance to create new space for new visions and futures.
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*The Team Who've Help Make 7 Minute Stories a Top Storytelling Podcast:
Story created & performed by: Aaron Calafato
Senior Audio Engineer: Ken Wendt
Additional vocals: Cori Calafato
Art: Pete Whitehead
Original Theme Music: thomas j. duke
Additional Soundscape Design: Isaac Gehring
TRANSCRIPT
Aaron Calafato:
Hey, 7 Minute Stories listener. Welcome to Season 6.
I’m beaming to you live on location just for this premiere episode. I’m in a place that is in transition right now. You might hear the echo in the room, the traffic outside, or people walking back and forth with a coffee in hand, having conversations.
As I’m talking to you, I’m looking through the window, out onto a public square. And I’ll admit—I’m a little worried. I’m a little nervous. I’m not sure if it’s irrational or not, but maybe by telling you this story, we’ll figure it out together.
You’re listening to 7 Minute Stories. This is Season 6.
First, let’s talk about barbershops. There are all kinds.
There’s the community barbershop—the one you walk into on a Saturday morning. The candy-striped pole spins outside. Inside, it’s full of friends, neighbors, family. Some people are just sitting in the chairs not even getting a haircut—they haven’t in years. They’re just there to be part of it.
Then there’s the salon: intimate, personal, with relationships built over years and a pampered touch. Before that, there was the old-school hairdresser, an experience all its own.
Some barbershops today are high-tech, full of big screen TVs and flashing lights. It feels like social media on steroids—except everyone’s got scissors in hand. Then there are the neighborhood shops where you walk in and people look at you like, what are you doing here? The cigar smoke, the serious faces, Sinatra or maybe opera playing softly in the background.
And then there’s my favorite—the Norman Rockwell barbershop. A small-town place that feels timeless. The candy-striped pole outside. Simple. Familiar. It’s a collective memory for so many of us—whether we experienced it ourselves, or saw it in a painting and remembered it anyway.
That’s the place I’m telling you this story from.
This used to be Jim’s Barbershop in Medina, Ohio. Before that, it had been a barbershop for generations. But it’s not Jim’s anymore. It’s about to become something new.
As I stand here, I look through the same window I did as a kid. The sunlight still pours in just right. The barber’s chair used to sit right here. My dad, my brother, and I would come in on Saturday mornings to get our hair cut.
Jim ran the place with warmth. A broad smile. A few questions about your day. Outdated People magazines stacked in the corner, as they always are in barbershops. And for me, the memory of being there with my dad and my brother—that light coming through the window, the sounds of the square outside—that feeling is core to who I am.
A few months ago, my wife Cori and I were walking downtown when we saw the barber pole being taken down. That’s when the fear crept in: What’s going to happen to my memories?
I can’t stand all this change, I thought. When the places that hold our most important memories change or disappear, it feels like those memories might fade too.
A couple of years ago, on this podcast, I said: Buildings stay and people fade. But standing here today, I realize I was wrong.
The energy of this place—the people, the stories, the decades of life lived here—it doesn’t go away. It’s in me. It’s in the people of this town. It’s in these walls. And it stays alive when we preserve it, when we tell stories like this.
That’s how memories endure. And what’s left behind? Space for something new.
I met the new owners. They opened the space up to me so I could tell this story. They didn’t have to, but they did. And it felt right. It felt like this place still has a future.
And that’s what I believe Season 6 is about: making space for new stories, even as we carry the old ones forward.
Thank you for joining me at what used to be Jim’s Barbershop. Don’t worry—just like the sunlight streaming through the window, the future is bright.
I’ll leave you now with a few seconds of the ambient sounds of this square.
