#unnoticedthings

A small corner where I collect stories hidden inside ordinary things.

The moments people call normal. The routines nobody notices. The quiet strength, simple kindness, unnoticed efforts, strange little perspectives — the things that don’t look inspirational at first glance, but somehow stay with me.

This blog is about finding meaning in the everyday.

The hairdresser shuffles around my mom's seated figure, holding up a pair of scissors as she combs my mother's hair and snips off the little jagged ends. I watch them as they fall to the ground in a flurry of black and scatters themselves on the dirty tiled floor. 

I fall back in the chair with a small sigh, squirming as I observe the small, rough and unclean room. There isn't much to see except posters of models with different hairstyles that I know would look absolutely horrible on me, so I settle back down and make myself comfortable on the chair, pulling out my Kindle and waiting until it is my turn.

The room is silent except for the sound of the scissors snipping away and the little grumbling noises my brother makes from the other end of the room. He's grumpy after mom yelled at him earlier during the day, I note. After a little while of reading, the hairdresser grunts and yanks the white cloth off of my mom. "Done," she says in her gruff voice and makes her way towards her supplies to get the container of water.

My mom sits up and inspects her hair in the mirror. With a satisfied look, she leans back on her chair and turns to look at me.

The hairdresser comes my way and sprays the water in my hair to make it easier to brush, and then she pulls her comb through my hair, stopping at one of the tangles. With surprisingly gentle movements for a woman like her, she untangles them and runs the comb through my hair again, several times, until she holds up her scissors and snips away part of my hair, and then she moves on to another part.

I sit there helplessly, a protest forming at the tip of my tongues at how much hair she's cutting. I'm staring in the mirror and watching her every movement as my hair falls to the ground, and I can't help thinking, that's my hair on the ground, how dare she! as my remaining hair falls into layers surrounding my face.

I stare again at my face in the mirror and I can't help wincing at how I look. Ashamed, almost, my neck slackens and I concentrate on the ugly mark engraved on the dirty wall, refusing to look at myself. The hairdresser yanks my head back up as I do so, her rough fingers grazing the underside of my chin, and she mutters something under her breath.

Well she's certainly moody,I think.

After a while, she steps back and yanks the cloth off of me and says curtly, "Done." She then pushes her materials to one side and walks outside to resume the card game she was previously playing before we arrived.

I glance up hesitantly and touch my new hair. It hasn't changed much, to my relief, although I don't really like it. A small, defeated sigh escapes my lips as I stand up, brushing the little ends of black away from my clothes.