Sunday, January 10, 2010

Peeling the Onion



Our daughter had her first haircut yesterday. I have to admit that I have been avoiding this step for some time now. The straight fuzzy "old" hair that she was born with lay lightly on top of all of her new growth underneath giving her the look of a nice little comb over. It was finally decision making time. Do we cut off the old stringy hair, thereby revealing all of her lovely new hair? Do we leave the hair that she came into this world with, thereby letting us hold onto that last little bit of baby she still has in her. What to do? To cut or not to cut..that was the question. The decision came to me while chopping an onion. Weird? Probably. However, as I was peeling the skin of the onion, I thought about what would have happened if the person that discovered the onion had looked at it and thought, "What a weird crunchy ball". What if they hadn't peeled back the layers to reveal what it could be? No one would have ever had a good gravy for their pasta, or tasty gumbo to enjoy. Sometimes peeling back the layers, even when you are unsure of the outcome, can be good....wonderful even. We made the decision to cut. We took her to the woman that cuts my hair and she started chopping away. I tried to remain calm and ignore that lump that crept into my throat and the ache that edged into my heart when she pulled out her scissors and they touched her golden hair. I hid behind my camera and kept myself distracted. I like taking pictures when I don't feel like dealing with a moment at hand. You can escape right there and disappear behind your viewfinder. Perfect for the occasional antisocial moment too. Snip. Snip. Kate was a dream and loved every minute. What we discovered under the mess was a mound of beautiful curls! They would have never seen their full potential if we had held onto our silly fears. What we also found was her "baby face" again. A clip of her baby hair was saved in a tiny envelope so that I may pull it out whenever I please, to feel what her hair used to feel like. I also have some pretty great photographs to remind us that sometimes we just need to dig in and peel. That is good enough for me.

4 comments:

  1. I finally got my google thing going! YAY!
    On a whole different note:
    Farrah-you are a MARVALOUS writer! I love your blog site! The calming butter yellow against a darling "black and white" of your precious daughter - with her new hair cut! BEAUTIFUL! How you will love and cherish this later in life (even more than now-believe it or not!) How did you come to create this? I have no idea how to do this , but would love to also have a blog. Keep it up kiddo! (YOU GOT TALENT!)

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  2. Oh Sheli! You humble me...a blog is so easy to do! You just need to sign up for it at blogspot.com, choose a template and start typing away! There are so many options and this site is very user friendly!
    And too, I don't journal and this gives me an way to do both things!

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  3. My favorite so far...I agree that you are very talented in storytelling as well!! You have the cutest kids, but what else should we expect from such a cute and sweet mommy?!!!

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  4. We'll talk after the summer...I have an idea brewing!

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