Wildwood

Hair represents both stability and change because it is synonymous with identity. It is one of the three things Lola’s mother holds in high esteem: “After her face and her hair, her tetas are what she is most proud of” (Paragraph 3). Hair is a feature that defines beauty and thus conformity. Lola’s hair is straight like her mother’s. When Belicia begins to lose her hair to cancer treatment, she pulls the rest of it out and saves it in a plastic bag. Meanwhile, Lola garners her mother’s ire and the ridicule of the kids on the block when she alters her hairstyle to look like a punk chick. Karen shaves Lola’s hair at her request and when her mother sees it, violence ensues. For Belicia, who wears a wig after the cancer, there are few things worse than losing your hair. She sees Lola, who has shaved hers off, and the trauma is triggered. “The next day my mother threw the wig at me. You’re going to wear this. You’re going to wear it every day. And if I see you without it on I’m going to kill you!” (Paragraph 18). The animosity between them arises from how Belicia wants to cling to her culture and ancestry, which her hair represents, whereas Lola wants to reject it. By cutting her hair, Lola has unintentionally communicated to her mother that she doesn’t value the thing Belicia cherishes, and Belicia’s envy of Lola’s hair turns to fury at what she perceives to be disrespect.