I know my sister was deeply wounded. She is the most brilliant and broken person I have ever known. I may never understand what hurt her so badly that it made her hurt so many others in return, but to me, she was her own most permanently damaged victim. From my perspective she chose to take up permanent residence in “Victimland.” The promise of her life was squandered in a tragic series of cheap bargains rather than being redeemed through the difficult, lifelong work of recovery and rebuilding oneself.
Alison has burned me in many ways and more times than I can count. Over and over I have tried to be her fire department, financing treatments and paying for stays in premium rehabs. But even with substantial resources, there is no way to rescue someone who doesn’t realize they’re burning. The scars I carry from my sister are not just a reminder, they are lessons. They have taught me that perhaps our worlds are far too different to ever overlap, hers made of fire and mine of the light.
I always hoped and wished Alison would get better, so we could get better. I understand she was severely emotionally injured and had to take her enduring pain out on someone. She chose me. Through the years, both my sister and brother have put me on the chopping block, sold lies to any gossip rag or trashy website that would buy or listen. They have attacked me for decades. But when I was twelve years old, my sister drugged me with Valium, offered me a pinky nail full of cocaine, inflicted me with third-degree burns, and tried to sell me out to a pimp. Something in me was arrested by all that trauma. That is why I often say, “I’m eternally twelve.” I am still struggling through that time.
And I miss you, dandelion
And even love you
And I wish there was a way
For me to trust you
But it hurts me every time
I try to touch you
—“Petals”
DETANGLED AND SWEPT AWAY
In the photograph, bright rays of sun shine down on me like a spotlight, and the hot dog I’m holding has a big, happy bite taken out of it. My hair is a range of gold highlights, raw sienna, wheat blond, and sweet lemon, lit by the sun. Soft, thick waves of it are blowing in layers away from my face as a few ringlets sweep up off my shoulders. There is a tenderness in my gaze, cut slightly with seriousness at the edges of my eyes.
This photo is one of my favorites from my childhood. In it, I look like a typical first grader on summer break. I look like I belong to somebody who knows how to look after me. I appear well cared for. But I wasn’t.
My childhood was rife with neglect. There were many things about me that my mother didn’t understand how to nurture or maintain—but the most obvious, most symbolic, and most visible was my hair.
My hair was rooted to no one. No one did my hair. No one knew how. We didn’t have conditioner (or “cream rinse,” as it was called back in the day) at my mother’s house. There were no pomades, wide-toothed combs, or hard-bristled brushes. There was no Sunday ritual of getting my hair washed and braided; certainly, there was no greasing of the scalp. There was no order made in my hair. I never felt the tidiness or security of having my hair done.
As a result, my hair was often a matted, tangled mess. And no one around me could fully understand the particular humiliation of being a nonwhite little girl with unkempt hair. I didn’t have the language for it, but I carried the burden of how it felt. My neglected hair was a siren, signaling that I was different from all the little white girls—and from little Black girls too. My wild, mixed, and mangled curls made me feel inferior, unworthy of receiving proper attention.
There was no going to the salon, dahling. I don’t recall my mother ever going to a salon. She fully subscribed to that bohemian, no-fuss beauty philosophy of the 1950s and ’60s. For her, a full beat face was eyeliner—a little cat wing, if she was being extra fancy—a swish of mascara, a touch of blush, a lip, and voilà! Flawless face. Her hair was fabulous, either up or down. Even if she had believed in seeking professional grooming services, for her or me, we could never afford it. And besides, there were no salons in that part of Long Island that could comprehend the contradictions of my tendrils, the sheer complexities of the needs of my hair. At that time there weren’t mixed-texture professionals anywhere, really, nor were there any specialized products. I was living tangled in between an Afro Sheen and a Breck Girl world.
The two constant representations of female beauty I saw on a daily basis were my mother and TV commercials. I admired and deeply desired the dark, smooth perfection of my mother’s long, luxurious hair. The contrast between how my mother’s hair looked when she woke up in the morning and how mine did was profound. She would shake her head, and thick, straight hair would tumble down like a yard of heavy silk crepe, draping into an elegant pool across her shoulders. I, on the other hand, had smashed-down, fuzzy, sweaty clumps, exploding in a cacophony of knots, waves, and curls all over my head.
And then there was the hair I saw on TV, the magnificent, sunshine-filled, slow-motion-blowing-in-the-wind-while-running-barefoot-through-fields-of-flowers hair. I was enchanted by those commercials, especially the ones for Clairol Herbal Essence shampoo. It was as if Eve herself was in the Garden of Eden, bottling the thick, emerald-green nectar made of earthly delights of herbs and wildflowers. I was convinced this shampoo would give me the heavenly
