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| Thursday, December 14, 2006 |
| The Haircut |
She woke up early on a bright summer's day, excited because her mother promised today was her turn to get a haircut. She carefully selected her favorite Strawberry the Shortcake sweater and a pair of Rustler jeans for the blessed event. Her teenage sisters had all chosen to sport the new 'layered' affect, and that was her goal.
At nine years old, her sisters were placed on a special shelf in her heart, right up there with the Disney Princesses, Paula Abdul, and all things cool or elite. They encouraged her adoration. Spent time with her. Allowed her to witness the glories of being an age that you aren't constantly told your too small for everything. They patiently tolerated her mundane silly questions about the wonders of leg shaving, makeup, and boys.
Her sisters were both popular, near in age, and looked astonishingly alike. They were mistaken one for the other their entire childhood, pre-pubescent, and juvenile lives. Oh, they were beautiful, talented creatures! She often wondered why she had to be so ordinary. In her nine year old mind, she resolved that her sisters took all the good genes, and that was their ONLY fault. They didnt leave any for her. Tall for her age, thin with sinewy muscles, she was flat as a board, pocked with freckles, and had a gap between her front teeth. The only thing she liked about herself was the azure blue of her eyes, and her long chocolate colored silky hair. Her mother insisted on washing it with some crazy concoction including beer, mayonaise and raw eggs... sounds terrible, and it was, but it made the hair of your head so illustrious, it was unreal.
She skipped down the hall, pausing briefly to pound on the bathroom door. Family tradition, it was the only room in the house that was always occupied, the only room you could lock yourself into for a little privacy. She pours herself a bowl of cornflakes. She's humming as she pours the milk and cuts the banana into her cereal. Her brother comes in from outdoors, pushes her shoulder, asking why she was so happy. She sticks her tongue out at him, ignores his question, and takes her first bite. He tells her there was a snake in the garden that morning, which brings him to remind her of her two rows of corn overgrown with weeds. She looks up, asking him who died and made him the chore monitor. In turn, he bonks her head with the cereal box, she gets up and runs crying to her mother... who is snoring happily in her bed. Dad had to work that day, and mom worked the night before. Both were absolutely exhausted, what with six kids to feed and dress, a mortgage, car note, utility bills, not to mention having three more adult children, grandchildren, extra expenses, health problems, incessant worry, careers, and church obligations.. neither seemed to ever really rest.
Bursting into her mothers room, seeing her sleeping peacefully, she choked off her cries in wonder. It was a sight she had rarely seen, so she crept up to the bed and just stood there, watching her. She marvelled at how soft and young her mother's face was, how much she resembled an angel, despite the stream of drool pooling on her pillow. Mother's keen sense of awareness must have edged itself into her dreams, because quite suddenly she bolted upright, knocking the very life breath and feet out from under her daughter. "Wha's 'sa matter?" queries a sleepy, dream laden woman with bed head. Her daughter recovers, throwing her arms around her very own angel from heaven, she forgets about her brother assaulting her. Good Mornings are exchanged and mother asks daughter if she's ready for her first real haircut.
The woman hired to lop the hair off said child's head lived across the street in a white brick house. She had children of her own about the same age as the girl. They had waited at the same bus stop for the entire four years of her schooling career, gone to church together, and even played together once and awhile. It was a safe assumption that the lot of them were friends. Mother called across the road via telephone, then sent daughter over to get the deed done.
The stylist's children were playing about the room noisily when she entered, only pausing briefly to say hello. She quietly climbed into the barber's chair, folding her hands in her lap, she found she was suddenly nervous. The stylist shakes out a plastic biblike sheet over her and buttons it tightly about her neck. Irrevrently the woman begins to spray the child's hair with a bottle of water, combing, picking the knots out with a fury. She pauses momentarily when she sees the young girl's face twisted in agony, asking if it hurts. She switches to spritzing detangler. She pulls from her drawer a tiny pair of black handled scissors that fit into her hand as though they were a detatchable part of her anatomy, like a transformer. She's asking the little girl how she wants the cut, to which the child shyly replies,
"Layered, please."
"Like your sisters?"
"Yes, please."
The stylist smiles knowingly and begins to snip away. She instructs the girl to turn her head this way and that, helplessly the child watches as more and more of her precious hair falls to the floor. Meanwhile, the stylist asks question upon question about family and school, friends and church activities. The girl just wants her to be quiet and pay attention to her work. A mistake from this woman could completely destroy her social life.
Mid-cut a small "huh" emits from the stylists lips. She had been talking about her daughter's project for church. A thread of black dread began weaving in the young girl's chest. The woman instructs her to sit forward a moment, to lean her head so that her hair falls into her face. The girl feels the cool of the stylist's fingers on bare flesh where thousands of hairs should be stalking proudly from follicles gone dormant. "What is that?" they each ask the other in unison. Abruptly the woman pulls the girl's shoulders back. She begins to say that there's a quarter sized bald spot in the middle of the back of the child's head, hesitating, she asks new questions.
"Did you pull a rubber band out of your hair without unwinding it from your ponytail?"
"No."
"Has someone pulled your hair?"
"No."
"Did you shave it?"
"Of course Not."
The woman, baffled, falls silent. She finishes the young lady's haircut, accepts the check scrawled hurriedly by her neighbor, gently hugs the girl and turns her chair toward the mirror. Removing the plastic sheet, she smiles a bright fake smile, asking what the child thinks. As the girl brushes bits of itching hair off her shoulders, admiring her new cut in the mirror, the stylist dials the phone across the road. The girl didn't want to take up more time than she absolutely had to, and was excited to show off her new style to EVERYONE she knew, so she hurriedly thanked her friend's mother and went home to her own.
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posted by katmandusuekookachoo @ 10:03 AM  |
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| Tuesday, December 12, 2006 |
| Midas Touch |
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| posted by katmandusuekookachoo @ 11:12 AM |
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