White Hairs

I was looking in the mirror while drying my hair when I noticed something shining in my head. I was not wearing my eyeglasses so to make sure that they were not shiny super dandruffs, I went to the computer table, picked up my glasses and wore them. And just as I suspected, they were not shiny super dandruffs, they were white hairs. My gulay, I don’t know which is worse: super shiny dandruffs or super shiny white hairs. I mean, no matter how super dandruffs can be it can be defeated. I can have my head shaved, applied hot virgin coconut oil, then scrubbed with anti-fungi cream and to make my scalp super resistant to fungi, I can drink vitamin E and then rub some of them vitamins on my scalp.

But white hairs?

My father used to have us pull out his white hairs. It’s a sort of a rite of passage. My older siblings did it before me and my younger siblings did it after me. I don’t know about my other siblings but when my father asks me to pull out his white hairs, I was most of the times compensated. My father paid me five centavos a piece. The pay is good considering that fifty centavos then can buy me a bottle of local soft drinks (Pop Cola) and a piece of bread. Today, I’m offering my daughter a peso a piece. This is quite expensive compared to the five centavos I used to get when I was a kid. But my daughter will not take it; she would not pullout my white hairs. I cajoled, pleaded and threatened but she will not be intimidated. I remember not being able to say not to my father. If my father asked me to pull out his white hairs, pull out I must compensated or not because if I didn’t obey…well…but usually it didn’t even come to that part, I always obeyed.

Now, I can’t do that because today it’s called child abuse.