My hair is long enough now that it can hold itself up if I tie it right. Before tiny clots slipped into my brain and dented the hardware, this would have been impossible, length or no. My hair was slippery soft then, resistant to anything that wasn't a beeline freefall.
I could coil the strands around a silently burning cylinder and, for a second, the straight pull of my hair would yield to a forced roundness. But then, quick as it appeared, it would whisper away the curl.
Now my hair swishes instead of slips. To most people, it sounds the same, but to me, who has been carrying around this field my whole life, the difference is still startling. Sometimes I turn my head to see who is standing so close that I can hear their hair.
I shift my fingers through the locks and it is like touching a stranger.
I take a pinch and wind it tight. If I hold it there for just a few seconds, it'll keep the shape I've mimicked.
Yes, I can curl this strange hair with my fingers. No heat required. No pink plastic rolls whorled under a cap necessary.
I don't know if I liked my old hair better than my new hair, and I don't know how long it'll take to become accustomed to the swish, but I do like that this very big part of my life didn't just leave without a trace, didn't just whisper itself away like a heat pressed curl.
I have a little texture now. I twist my hair up and knot it above my head. It stays.
Look at that.
Some part of me has finally learned to stay.
Pssst. The 22nd is Pepper Day. Post something, anything, to play along with us. https://cheerpeppers.wordpress.com/every-22nd/
