14. The Hair I love
It was like a scarifice for Cancer. No matter how prepared you say you are, it is all mentally. When you actually about to do it, somehow, your mental preparation goes burst & it becomes chokingly painful, inside you. Shaving my hair. Am smiling here, but it was difficult to hold back the tears & the lump in your throat almost choking me. As tears came down my cheeks, my sister Geetha held my hand as though she knew my pain, without speaking. Linus had the task to make me “beautifully bald”.
The wind will not blow a strand of hair out of place & I will not be able to put my fingers through my hair. If it was just a fashion, maybe I would not be so emotional and I don’t know why and I am not going to beat myself up in analysing this; but Cancer made a difference. I am forced to. It was like giving in to this shitty thing, almost taking my identity away. I didn’t recognise myself; that was not me in the mirror. Took some time to be able to stand infant of the mirror and take a good look at myself without turning away quickly. After a while, it gets comfortable in accepting the look but that doesn’t mean I feel “me”…but at least I beat Cancer, because I won’t see my hair fall off….
The Nair sisters are a strong bunch of ladies; my sisters Latha, Shanthi and Geetha arrived the same day as my long strands of hair was being shaved off. The kitchen became ablaze with cooking, laughter, and endless evenings of talk & laughter - the symbolic noisy Nair sisters’ atmosphere. I had lessons on how to dress up my head with scarfs; went shopping for accessories to go with it. My head was being glamourised. They were going to “rock” that hair style. I am blessed.
It is the beginning for me to start realising that I will never be normal again. But I will be “rocking” a new me in this journey. I don’t know how I will be when I am finished with my treatment. It is too heavy to think so far ahead, because I realise now things change all the time when you are on this journey. So for now, more glamorous perhaps. I may become a damn good actress by then…hmmm Hollywood with George Clooney or a scene with Ola Rapace will do.
Thank you all those who are still rocking with me; flowers, visits, calls, texts, IG likes, they all carry weight …. please know how much I love you for that. You know who you are.
Song that is on repeat now is “I Didn’t Fallin Love with Your Hair” by Brett Kissel - you must listen to it. And guess what, hair or no hair, I still could dance…
P.S. I just realised the irony here; I am a Cancerian and cancer is claiming a bonding period with me….
I heard the Whispers of dear ones …” you rock”
May 2022