How is it that every day – Every. Day. – I find myself tortured by a single hair that has affixed itself to my side? It’s always in the same place – on my left side, within reaching distance of my left elbow, but just out of eyeline, so that I can only catch tiny glimpses of the hair if I contort my body in just the right sunlight. It does not seem to matter which shirt I am wearing – the hair is always there. Always grasping for the delicate skin of my inner arm, yet darting nimbly out of the way when I start feeling around for it with the fingers on my right hand. It’s tricky, too, pretending to retreat when I brush at my side. Only to pop up again when I am doing things like unloading the dishwasher or trying to make pancakes. (Don’t get excited. I am merely putting pre-made – by Eggo – pancakes into the microwave and then flipping them once.) Eventually, I get so mad at the hair, I wage all-out war, plucking at my shirt, my arm, my head, until I FINALLY extract the offending strand. It is typically, somehow, through the mysterious magic of hair, lodged INSIDE my shirt, as though the fabric had developed hair follicles and sprouted its own lush if single-stranded mane.

Today, I was attacked from both sides: the ubiquitous hair on the left was joined by a rarely-but-not-never-seen hair on the right side. Why am I dancing in the kitchen before my first sip of tea, you ask. It’s not dancing but the writhing gyrations of a creature enduring ticklish agony from an unseen enemy.

Every day I struggle. Every day. I have long since given up asking how. And why. But, if there is a way to prevent this from happening (Ponytails: doesn’t work. Vigorous morning hair brushing: nada. Going nude: haven’t tried it, but I’m rapidly approaching it as an option.), I am all ears.