Training My Afro.

Book Extract

"Occasionally we would visit the hairdresser in the village.

Tucked away in the Essex countryside in the mid 60s, I can imagine the stylist saw my growing afro as quite a challenge. As my hair was half-afro, she had very little experience of it.

I would emerge from the salon resembling a poodle after she had spent what seemed like an eternity, combing through the tangled, matted frizz that the Aunties in the home were unable to tame. The more she brushed, the more she combed, the frizzier it became.

I looked like a human candyfloss.

I could hear her tutting as she wrestled with the density and volume of my hair. My eyes watered as she tugged fervently trying to remove her embedded comb from the mass of matted curls.

I tried not to cry as she violently struggled to unravel her weakened comb which had become irretrievably tangled.

My scalp throbbed - sore and tender from the constant ripping and tearing from its follicles. I wanted to scream at her - tell her to stop, but I never did. My head, pulled this way, then that way, then this way again.

I suffered in silence, my eyes filling with tears, praying that it would soon end.

It was debatable as to who was more relieved when the ordeal was finally over."

Extract from "Acceptance"

Author: Jan_Cain

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