“When you grow up around something for your whole life, you pick it up.”

Tina Watwood’s father and uncle were barbers when she was growing up, and she spent almost every day in her father’s shop, sweeping up hair after school and on weekends. Now, she’s a barber herself at K and T’s Kuttin’ Up on Main Street in Gardendale.

“I’m carrying on the family tradition,” she said. Watwood has been a barber for 23 years, and she’s been cutting hair in the Gardendale area for 14 years.

“It’s provided me a good living. I get to meet a lot of different people,” said Watwood.

She said she could cut a head of hair in 10 or 15 minutes, but she never does it that quickly because it would miss the point of why she does her job: Meeting new people.

“It depends on how long they talk,” she said. “We don’t run them through like numbers. They become friends and family. I’ve been cutting some people’s hair for as long as we’ve been in business.”

Watwood said most of her customers are males, probably because she’s a barber and they feel comfortable with her. In addition to a hair cut,  she can also do colors and perms. Watwood also shaves the back of her customers’ necks with a straight razor instead of an electric clipper like most barbers.

“A lot of places don’t do that anymore… To me, it makes a neater looking haircut,” she said.

She also said that she learns something new every day, even though she’s been a barber for over 20 years.

“I guess I enjoy what I do because I have fun at it,” she said. “If you cant have fun at it, why do it?”

Watwood grew up in Midfield, and has lived in Mt. Olive for 22 years.