When I was seven years old, Neye and I used to have our hair relaxed by our mum. Neye’s hair was long, dark, and tough; mine was soft, dark-brown, and long; as a result, hers was always the first to be relaxed.
On this particular day, mum had to relax our hair in preparation for our school’s upcoming party.
Neye carried our hair set and I followed with two big cups of Ozone relaxer in my growing hands until mum informed me that one was enough.
I held up the cup of relaxer like an apprentice for mum to relax Neye’s hair and vice versa. Not long after I sat, I started making painful gestures. Mum remarked, “obele ife na-da afuwa gi ufu, little things hurt you”. She was not ready for a ‘sorry’ spree.
I endured the stings and when I could not bear it, I spoke up, “Mummy, please, it’s okay. Stop massaging it.” She had attended to all the partitions so she left it.
“Go and sit under the fan”, she instructed us and went inside. On her way back, she met me at the entrance of the parlour.
“Mummy, please, wash my hair.”
“It won’t be silky if you wash it off now”, she tried to convince me.
“I want to wash it”, I insisted. The pain had become unbearable.
We went into the bathroom and mum asked me to bend over. Quivering and trying to muster the courage, I did. As the bowl of water emptied on my hair, I jumped up and gasped for air like a child who had just had a near-drowning experience. The tiled walls and floor were filled with splashes of relaxer. Mum’s body was messy, too. I was panting with my hands on my face clearing the drippings from my hair away from my eyes.
Polonius in Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ said,
“to thine own self be true”
Mum left the bathroom and returned with an old towel and descended on my hair with some firm squeezes. She dried the drippings and tied the towel around my head like that of the skincare models I watched on television.
She unzipped my wet dress and stepped out again while I waited in the bathtub like an innocent bride awaiting her suitor. Neye stood at the entrance of the door, looking pitifully at me.
Mum came back with a kettle of boiled water and began to dilute. Trying to express her frustration, she said to me, “Agozie, you know what? I will cut your hair after your school party”.
“Okay, mummy”, I surprised her, adding that she should pack my hair with my hairband instead of taking me to the salon for a hairdo. I was not ready for the hairdressers’ teasing: “my cry cry friend is here o”, “Shukurah, make sure you do not ‘tight’ her hair “; a customer comes in and comments “cry cry is plaiting her hair today, it means we will sleep here;” with Neye defending, “My sister is not cry cry”; then, a peal of funny laughter will follow. I just could not deal anymore.
“Okay”, mum agreed with a look of disappointment. She loved the way Neye and I were adorned with the same hairstyle. Soon, I will be different.
The party was over and I lived happily ever after throughout my remaining years in primary and secondary school with a self-soothing, comforting low cut.
That was all it took to end that drama in my life.
Polonius in Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ said, “to thine own self be true”. For many of us, the amount of dramas we would end in our lives, by acting on an honest talk with ourselves, is incredible. Why force yourself to be who you are not, do what you have not grown to handle, stay where you should not be, just because you want to belong?
We hear that a particular industry makes people rich; instantly, we leave our place of interest and begin to hustle in what we have no business doing at all. If we realise that the beauty of our lives stems from nurturing our respective gifts and talents; that jealousy results from looking outward instead of inward; that sometimes, we are the architect of our problems by not owning our uniqueness; that like me, all it takes might be to stop conforming and do what is peculiar to your own lives; if we realise these, then, together, we will become a coat of many colours, attractive and appreciating one another, rather than becoming a coat of colour riot, clashing and crushing ourselves down.
♦ Favour Chiagozie Ebubechukwu is an Editorial Staff Writer and columnist with the WAP
