The River of My Mother’s Hair
The River of My Mother’s Hair
A boy in 1967 Dalugama recalls his mother’s long, oiled hair — its fragrance, its braid, its quiet rhythm — woven into daily life, a tender memory that lingers like evening rain.
Iremember my mother’s hair the way one remembers the first rains after a long, hot summer. Straight and black, almost a yard of it, shining with the coconut oil she rubbed in each morning. In the half-light of our house in Dalugama, sunlight slipped through the iron grills, catching the dust in the air, and her hair seemed a dark river flowing quietly through the day.
I liked to sit close while she worked on it. She would sit on the low wooden chair by the kitchen window, comb in hand, and give me the small bottle of coconut oil to hold. I felt proud of that little duty. The kitchen smelled of woodsmoke, rice steaming in clay pots, and most of all, the fragrance of her hair.
From outside came the sounds of Dalugama mornings: the bread man’s bell tinkling as he wheeled his bicycle down the lane, children calling to one another on their way to school, and the church bell chiming softly from the pillared church not far away. The crows in our guava tree never kept quiet for long.
Sometimes my mother bent forward, and her hair fell over my fingers like a cool curtain. I tried to smooth it, but only tangled it further. She laughed at my efforts — her laughter was light and forgiving — and then, with quick, practised hands, she gathered the strands into a thick braid.
“It is easier this way,” she would say, “there is rice to wash, uniforms to iron, water to carry.” But I thought of it as something else — her quiet grace woven into every day. The braid swung gently against her back as she moved about the house, keeping time with her steps like a secret music.
After her bath, she wrapped her hair in a towel and went about her chores as though it was no burden. The loose strands she combed out were never thrown away. She rolled them into a tiny bundle and tucked them safely in a box at the bottom of her cupboard.
And in the evenings, when she unbraided her hair and let it fall free, she seemed changed. No longer only my mother with her household worries, but a young girl again, walking barefoot down a village path at dusk, her dreams as long and flowing as her hair.
At night, as the house grew still and the last kerosene lamp flickered out, I would lie beneath the mosquito net, listening to the soft chorus of crickets and the distant barking of dogs along the lane. Through the thin partition wall, I could hear the quiet rustle of my mother’s braid against the pillow. That sound, gentle and familiar, was the last thing I heard before sleep came — and even in dreams, it stayed with me, like a lullaby woven out of love and memory.
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