My hair has been my prized possession, the one part of my earthly form that I loved the most (I still do, but you will perhaps understand the difference as you read on!). It gave me a sense of who I was. It was just so me. And so to get to a point when I was ready to let go of it on my own, was a huge thing for me. But it happened. Life happens. When we let it flow.
I remember always having long hair, from when I was a kid. Obviously as a kid, I could not take care of my own hair and depended on my mother, my grandmother or an aunt to help me take care of it. There were many rituals associated with my hair. What I remember is the weekly oil bath my sister and I used to have. We would get a nice oil massage for our heads and body and stand soaking it all in, for a long while. Our hair would be infused with the smell of methi seeds and peppercorns from the warm sesame oil. I remember the feeling of my eyelids drooping and closing in like a heavy blanket, as the oil soaked in and kept me on the brink of a sumptuous sleep. Just as I was dozing off, I would be woken up with a startling voice asking me if I was ready for a bath.
We mostly washed our hair with shikakai powder. Even as I think of it now, the pungent smell of shikakai powder still runs up into my nostrils. The bitterness of it still rolls up my tongue. Its tartness still burns my eyes. And yet, I loved it. It was the only thing that could take away the greasiness of the thick oil that laced my hair. And it left a lovely, fresh, earthy fragrance in the hair, which lingered for days.
What followed after this was another ritual - drying out our hair with sambrani incense (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benzoin_resin). Coarsely powdered sambrani was sprinkled on a smouldering fire created by
burning charcoal in a clay or metal
holder. A wicker basket was overturned over the holder and we had to sit with our backs to the smoke, leaning backward and letting our hair fall over
the basket so that the smoke rises through our hair, dries it and
leaves its lingering fragrance. My mother or grandmother (and later my dear husband!) would move around and adjust my flowing hair over the basket, so that all parts would dry out and get soaked in the fragrant smoke. It would often take a good half an hour to get one's hair almost completely dry. I loved every moment of it - the sensuality in this ritual. I could sit with my eyes closed for as long as it took, to dry my hair, slipping into a kind of meditative state, with all the sounds around me fading and merging into the sole crackling sound of the embers, with the warm smoke rising up like the mist to engulf my hair, my face and the entire room. Divine!
My aunt sometimes and my grandmother would then do my hair up into a 'pai-pinnal' (translated as 'bag braid'). I remember how I used to sit with awe and feel them do the complicated braid with finesse - the result of years of devoted practice. The hair would have to be taken in strands from each side, following a pattern, and would then be braided together. The end result was a braid which was woven like a bag - amazing! Sometimes, they would tuck in a string of jasmine flowers into the braid, almost like tucking something into a bag :) The heady smell of jasmine and the sweet sambrani merged into one intoxicating mix, making one feel as if one was leading them along from some wild forest.
All my life, up until now that is, I have braided my hair for most parts of the time, occasionally tying it into a pony tail, or putting it up into a tight bun. I have always loved my hair done up in some way, so that it doesn't stream into my face. I liked it in place. Always. Perhaps that made me feel safe. I don't know. I remember my mother doing up my long waist length hair into two braids for school days. Two tight plaits, tied with ribbon. Everything in place. Perfect. The same way every single day. And I never got tired of it. I never asked for it to be any other way. I don't know why.
In my teens, I graduated to having it done into a single braid. That was the only exploring I ever did, until now! I never wanted it any other way. I still remember the day I learned for the first time to make a braid on my own. No one taught me directly. I learned it myself by watching them do it for me, feeling the steps, and then trying it over and over again until I got it right.
And then came my journey into Bharatnatyam. My sister and I learned this dance form from when we were 6 years old I think, up until our arangetram, when I was in my late teens. The only part of dressing up that I liked, for all the numerous programmes that we were a part of, was to have my hair braided with a 'raakkodi' and a 'kunjalam'. I loved my hair feeling longer than it actually was. I loved decorating it with that unique piece of temple jewellery. My grandfather had bought an antique piece of temple jewellery from an old temple, long ago in an auction, for my mother's arangetram, when she was barely 12 or 13 years old. I remember loving that piece and wearing it for my arangetram and then my wedding - the only piece of jewellery I ever liked! I think I secretly felt like a goddess when I wore that :) Funnily though, I had no desire to wear it at all after my wedding day. Strange how desires appear and disappear!
Ever since my teens, college days and then working days, I have stuck to this one hairstyle - a single braid. And I am happy that no one made fun of me, no one asked me to change my hairstyle, no one questioned it even. Perhaps also because I was very comfortable with it myself. It was a part of me that I was very happy about and loved. It gave me something to identify myself with.
The only time I wished I did not have such long hair was when I was down for a month, with the most wretched bout of chickenpox, a few years ago. I had the most virulent attack, with huge, painful blisters all over my body, including my scalp and hairline. There were times when I was in excruciating pain and then an unbearable itchiness. I could not wash my hair. I could not comb it. I could not touch it. I don't know how I survived that, and the one month in isolation. I remember hating my hair for the first time then, before falling in love with it again :)
The first time I was scared of losing my hair and wondered how it would be to not have hair or to lose it all, was when a few months prior to my falling ill, my mother was diagnosed with cancer and there was talk of chemotherapy, radiation and its side effects. Thankfully, she did not need radiation, and only needed to be on medication. But the thought of losing hair was terrifying.
And so, that in short, is the story of my hair, until the climax of course :) As you can see, I have never been to a salon to get a haircut. The only time my hair was touched was perhaps when they shaved off my hair when I was a year old. Not after that.
A few days ago, when we were talking to Raghav about his haircut, which he finally agreed to having, a wild thought flew into my head. I wanted to cut my hair! Just like that! For no real reason. I thought it was a good opportunity to do that with him. I had made no plans as such. I had no clue as to how I was going to feel, how I was going to manage etc. But I also had no fear. I just wanted to go ahead and do it. I asked my son and husband how they felt about it and they asked me to do whatever I wanted.
Over the past few weeks or so, I had felt a shift inside....something was giving, something was leaving. Perhaps some old fear or thought or belief that was no longer serving me or its purpose. I don't know as yet. Then, I also happened to watch a documentary on living and dying that touched me very deeply, where he speaks about rituals and ceremonies, and how every time he took something from nature, he did a little ceremony of giving something back in gratitude and in understanding of the interconnectedness of life and death and all of creation. I was deeply moved by that too.
Perhaps all of that was playing on my mind and heart. I felt I had to physically and symbolically let go of something that was very precious to me....something which made me feel and identify with what I called and saw as 'myself'. I felt this urge to move out of my comfort zone, push my boundaries a little more, do something totally out of character, something wild and spontaneous to celebrate myself, and expand the space that I called and loved as 'myself'. The first thing that came to my mind was of course my hair! And so I went and had my first ever, down-to-earth, simple haircut. It was a huge thing for me to do after all these years of being rooted in an image of myself. But I did it! And am very happy that I did it! For when I let go of my hair finally, yes, there was some sadness that comes from a part of you leaving, but also a joy and a relief from sensing a new-found freedom from the confines of a self-limiting thought, belief and fear.
I enjoyed every moment of my first haircut. The girl was kind, cheerful and gentle. I enjoyed her washing my hair out, then drying it (with a hair dryer, no incense or wicker basket!), and then snipping off my long tresses. With each snip, I felt that something that wasn't serving me anymore was leaving me. I closed my eyes, said a quiet thank you to it for being with me for 40 odd years, and then smiled and bid goodbye. In the bargain, she cut my hair a little too short - shorter than what I had wanted :). But it didn't bother me too much. I asked her what they usually did with the cut hair. She told me with a tinge of sadness, that this salon just threw it all out. I asked her why, for which he had no answer. I guess she understood my sadness too. For she smiled gently and told me how she loved my hair and that she would keep the long bits herself to practice colouring hair (mixing the colours etc.). I could see how much she enjoyed her job of being a hairdresser/stylist. She moved and bent her body almost in a dance. It was a pleasure to watch her. I felt happy that my tresses were finally going to be put to good use.
So yes, I now have shoulder length hair from the waist length hair that I used to sport! And I am loving it! It is much more manageable in some ways. I don't have to braid it anymore. I don't have to think about washing it and drying it out so much. I feel much lighter inside out! I am enjoying it streaming across my face in the wind, and being out of place :) I am enjoying leaving it loose and not having to get worried about it getting all tangled and knotted up. I haven't told anyone else in my family, and am basking in the wildness and thrill of doing something totally different from what they are all so used to from me :) And yeah, I loove my new look :) which perhaps heralds the beginning of a new chapter in my life in many ways....a journey into the unknown...a journey into myself that I haven't exposed to the world....a journey into everything that I thought was me, but wasn't.....a journey into the 'me' that I am becoming and a journey into the me that is 'dying'....who knows? :)
